Mikhail Messerer is the chief choreographer of the Mikhailovsky Theatre. Mikhail Messerer: "People are no longer in the mood for jokes"

Ballet master Mikhail Messerer, in an interview with DP, recalled how he played with Vasily Stalin's airplane as a child, and told how Vladimir Kekhman, general director of the Mikhailovsky Theater, relates to the title "banana king".

With whom did the Messerers start as a famous artistic family?

From my grandfather Mikhail Borisovich. A dentist by profession, he was an insanely theatrical person. Of his eight children, five became notable artists. The eldest - Azariy - was an outstanding actor. On the advice of Vakhtangov, he took the sonorous pseudonym Azarin Azariy. Mikhail Chekhov wrote to him: "You, dear Azarich, are wise with your talent."

Next is Rachel. A stunningly beautiful woman, a silent film star, under the pseudonym Ra Messerer, played a dozen major roles in the 1920s. Having married Mikhail Plisetsky, Rachel Messerer-Plisetskaya became. Next in age is Asaf Messerer. He is the first person in our family to go to ballet. Premier, Asaf was perfectly professional, he achieved unprecedented virtuosity for those times. Many of the movements that almost everyone now does, he came up with. Then he became a famous teacher, for 45 years he led an improvement class, where all the stars of the Bolshoi Theater of the 1950-1960s studied: Ulanova, Plisetskaya, Vasiliev, Liepa ...

Finally, the younger sister is Shulamith, my mother, the prima ballerina of the Bolshoi Theater and the champion of the USSR in swimming. I remember that at our house there was a prize - a figure of a swimmer - in 1928, my mother won the All-Union Spartakiad.

The next generation is the children of Ra and Mikhail Plisetsky: Maya, Alexander and Azariy. All three danced at the Bolshoi Theatre. Alexander died quite early. After the Bolshoi, Azariy left for Cuba, now he is a teacher in the famous troupe of Maurice Bejart Bejart Вallet Lausanne. Everyone knows about Maya (Plisetskaya. - Ed.). Asaf's son is theater designer Boris Messerer. As Maya's marriage to Rodion Shchedrin is known, so is Boris's marriage to Bella Akhmadulina, who passed away not so long ago.

They say that the relationship between your mother and Maya Plisetskaya was not cloudless.

After we ran away from the Soviet Union (1980 - Ed.), Mom crossed out everything unpleasant from her memories of her relatives and left only the positive, she spoke of everyone with love. Mom adored Maya. When her father, a prominent Soviet official, was shot and her mother was sent to the Gulag, Maya lived with my mother, who raised her, making sure that the girl continued to study at the Bolshoi Theater School. And when they came to take Maya to an orphanage for the children of enemies of the people, where, of course, there could be no question of any ballet - that is, the world would have lost the great Plisetskaya - my mother lay down on the threshold: "Over my corpse!" Can you imagine: in 1938! As my mother was told, the only legal way to avoid the orphanage was to adopt (stupid word, but that's right, not adopt) Maya. Which she did. When people disowned their husbands, wives, parents, children, my mother went and pushed for this adoption. Mom was a hero!

Your mother, People's Artist of the RSFSR, laureate of the Stalin Prize, was supposed to dance according to her rank government performances. Have you seen Stalin from behind the scenes?

After all, I was born in 1948, and he died in 1953. But on the other hand, Vasily Stalin went to visit his mother before he was arrested after the death of his father. He, being a general, commander of the Air Force of the Moscow Military District, was friends with her. And granddaughters, already the third generation of Stalins, visited us when I was three or four years old. I still remember my favorite toy - a stunning airplane from Vasya Stalin.

Svetlana Alliluyeva came, who was a theater lover and was also friends with her mother. When in February 1980, in Japan, my mother and I ran away from Soviet power and flew to New York, one of the first to meet us was Svetlana. The wisest woman, she told me how to behave in emigration - I simply obeyed these instructions, memorized her advice and turned to them internally many times.

How did you decide to escape from the USSR?

Of course, it's hard to decide. Although my mother and I discussed this for a long time. Now young people do not understand that time. It was disgusting to hear endless lies from the box, from colleagues. People were forced to constantly lie to each other and, in the end, lie to themselves, forcing themselves to believe in how much they adore the regime, fearing that otherwise the lies would not turn out to be very convincing. When the soloist of the Bolshoi Sasha Godunov remained in America, upon the return of the troupe to Moscow at the meeting, everyone was obliged to stigmatize the "bastard renegade." I remember that the theatre's chief choreographer, Yuri Grigorovich, delivered a speech at which the artists of my generation later laughed for a long time: "He will slide into the same place where their Leningrad predecessors Makarova and Nureyev slipped ..." And what could he, the poor, have to say?

The main sensation of the last Russian ballet season is the transition from the Bolshoi to Natalia Osipova and Ivan Vasiliev ...

I have the deepest respect for the Bolshoi Theater, for its director, Mr. Iksanov, I myself am from the Bolshoi, I have many friends there, so I don’t think it’s right to comment on this. But it seems to me that it is important for Russian art that the guys have a base in Russia, and not move, say, to New York.

But can we say that they invested their talent and fame in the Mikhailovsky Theater?

Undoubtedly, this is a valuable acquisition for our theater.

This season they danced your "Swan Lake", "Laurencia" and new editions of "La Bayadère" and "Don Quixote". It is clear that you, a teacher, can give them. But what do they give you?

Working with them is a pleasure. Even at rehearsals, sometimes it captures the spirit - I turn into a grateful audience, I have to force myself to make comments, there is undoubtedly a reason for which. I myself always try to learn from my students. Both Sylvie Guillem and Tamara Rojo - I name star names, because they are known, but sometimes a novice girl, a young boy has a lot to learn. And you need to learn from colleagues all your life, you can’t stop.

How are responsibilities distributed between you and the artistic director of the Mikhailovsky Ballet theater Nacho Duato?

Our theater has its own way. The vector of development of our troupe is to become the most modern in Russia, and preferably in Europe. To this end, Nacho puts on performances: he transfers his famous works and creates new ones. What could be better for our artists than to work with the luminary of modern choreography? I myself do not compose new texts, my specialty is classics. It is important for me that the quality of her performance is not inferior to the quality of contemporary choreography. Our tutors help me a lot. But no matter how wonderful the tutor is, he will inevitably pull in his direction. Everyone is a creative person, and he knows exactly what is best. And if his equally outstanding colleague has the opposite view on the same thing, someone has to make a decision. If you do not follow the performance as a whole, it will spread into shreds.

Domestic ballet conservatives believe that all the best is in the Soviet past. But longing for time - this is an ordinary longing for youth. How to draw the line between what is truly valuable and junk, memorable from childhood, and therefore beloved?

Yes, perhaps, youth is better than old age ... But it is wrong to dwell on what happened in your best years. When I arrived at the Mikhailovsky Theatre, I first suggested to the director that they stage Swan Lake by Mats Ek or Matthew Bourne. However, he chose the classic "old Moscow" edition by Alexander Gorsky, which I really know and love since childhood. And this decision of Kekhman turned out to be correct, the performance turned out to be successful.

How do you find a common language with Kekhman - a man of a completely different environment and experience?

But he has been in this position for 5 years, of which I have closely observed him for four years. Ideal people do not exist, but I must say that it is difficult for me to imagine a better theater director. From him, a businessman (Vladimir Kekhman owns a fruit importing company. - Ed.) One could expect organizational talent, but the fact that a person in the shortest possible time will understand so much about musical theater, and in the smallest details, was a pleasant surprise.

It seems to me that Kekhman began to understand the subject better than many professionals around him.

Moreover, all these years it is customary to write about him: "The banana king took up theater ..."

As for this stupid label, firstly, his business is not only bananas, and even far from only fruits, and secondly, Volodya treats such things with self-irony. He, thank God, has a great sense of humor, which distinguishes him favorably from the many directors with whom life brought me together in the West. True, if he encounters the slightest sloppiness, then people are not in the mood for jokes ... He never shouts, this is not his management style, but sometimes one glance of him is enough.

Kehman recently announced that your "Flame of Paris" will be released in January 2013. That is, you continue line of restoration of Stalin's drama ballets.

Working for 30 years in the West, from the outside I saw a gaping gap: wonderful performances of the 1930-1950s were lost in Russian ballet. Therefore, I welcome Leonid Yakobson, who restored Spartak and Shurale. This does not mean that only such performances should go on, but it is not good to lose them. If someone accuses me of retrograde, then I will not accept this reproach. Four years ago, having headed the Mikhailovsky Ballet, I immediately agreed with the French choreographer Jean-Christophe Maillot to stage his brilliant Cinderella with us, that is, Mikhailovsky was the first to invite him in Russia. And only now the Bolshoi invited him to the production. I also agreed with the young English choreographers Alistair Mariotte and Liam Scarlet - they have just shocked London audiences and critics with their work in a program dedicated to the longtime artistic director of the Royal Ballet Monica Mason.

Short

Mikhail Messerer is the chief guest choreographer of the Mikhailovsky Theatre. One of the most respected ballet teachers in the world. He has worked at Covent Garden, the American Ballet Theatre, the Paris Opera, La Scala, the English National Opera and other ballet companies in Europe, Asia, America and Australia. Among his productions at the Mikhailovsky Theater: Swan Lake, Laurencia, La Bayadère, Don Quixote.

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He has worked as a guest teacher at the American Ballet Theatre, the Paris National Opera, the Maurice Béjart Company, the Australian Ballet, the Ballet de Monte-Carlo, the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, the Florentine Opera House, the Royal Theater of Turin, the Arena Theatre. di Verona, Teatro Colon (Buenos Aires), in the ballet companies of Berlin, Munich, Stuttgart, Leipzig, Düsseldorf, Tokyo Ballet, English National Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, Royal Swedish Ballet, Royal Danish Ballet, Chicago Ballet, Turkish National Ballet , the Gothenburg Ballet, the Kullberg Ballet, the National Ballet in Budapest, the National Ballet of Marseille.

In the piggy bank of Mikhail Messerer such productions as "La Bayadère" by L. Minkus (Beijing, Ankara), "Cinderella" by Prokofiev (Tokyo - together with Shulamith Messerer), as well as "Swan Lake" by Tchaikovsky (Gothenburg), "Coppelia" by Delibes (London ), "The Nutcracker" by Tchaikovsky (Luxembourg).

Mikhail Messerer from the famous dynasty. His uncle Asaf Messerer was a wonderful dancer and led the "class of stars" at the Bolshoi Theater. The famous ballerina Maya Plisetskaya is his cousin. Azary Plisetsky, a teacher in the troupe of Maurice Bejart, and Moscow artist Boris Messerer are his cousins. Father Grigory Levitin was a circus performer, a racer on a vertical wall. Mother - Shulamith Messerer - a brilliant ballerina of the Bolshoi Theater and a world-famous teacher.
For a year now, Mikhail Messerer has been the chief choreographer of the Mikhailovsky Theatre. We talk with him in the rare minutes free from work.

— Mikhail Grigoryevich, your childhood was spent in the atmosphere of ballet. Is it possible to say that your future was predetermined, or was your mother, Shulamith Messerer, who, like no one else, who knew the pitfalls of this profession, did not really want you to connect your life with this type of art?
- It was my mother who sent me to a ballet school at the age of eleven, but I did not resist. Becoming a dancer was natural - everything in the family was subordinated to ballet. The profession of a ballet dancer at that time was considered very prestigious and economically profitable, albeit not easy: thanks to tours, you could see the world, visit different countries, which was impossible for most in the years of stagnation because of the notorious "iron" curtain.

After studying at the ballet school for some time, I realized that I like to dance, I like the atmosphere of the theater, theatrical life, despite the strict regime, endless rehearsals, performances, rehearsals again ... We participated with pleasure in children's performances of the Bolshoi Theater, absorbed the beauty around us, learned the skill from the luminaries of the ballet scene. Many years have passed since then, but childhood impressions have remained for life. I well remember the first student performances in the performances of the Bolshoi Theater "Romeo and Juliet" (now this production is no longer available), in "Don Quixote" - it was interesting and fun to dance. At the ballet school, we were often naughty, and at breaks we played football with pleasure, in a word, we behaved like all the guys of our age.

Then he graduated from the Moscow Choreographic School, entered the Bolshoi Ballet Company, studied with his uncle, Asaf Messerer, in the class of improvement of artists.
Knowing full well that the age of a dancer is short and there is a limit to possibilities, in 1978 I received the specialty of a teacher-choreographer, graduating from GITIS, where I was the youngest graduate: usually ballet dancers graduated from the institute already at the end of their dance activity.

- Having decided to stay in the West in 1980, you worked as a teacher in many troupes of the world for more than thirty years and all these years were extremely in demand. What is the secret of such success?
— The Russian classical ballet school and teaching experience accumulated over the centuries have always been valued abroad. In addition, after my escape to the West, there was a hype in the press, which served me well: in the ballet circles of the West, I became a popular person. For some time he danced in performances, but gradually pedagogy captured me entirely. He gave his first master classes at the New York Conservatory, they were successful, offers began to come from many theaters. I am very grateful to my teachers at GITIS E. Valukin, R. Struchkova, A. Lapauri, R. Zakharov, who helped me gain confidence in myself, in my teaching abilities. I often remember their testaments when I teach at London's Covent Garden and give master classes. In general, pedagogy has attracted me since childhood. Even at the choreographic school, I “gave classes” to my classmates when our teacher missed classes, and even then I saw that the guys were interested in them. Even now it is important for me that the artists like my master class, then this is a great joy for me. I consider it my duty to make life easier for a dancer, to teach him to control his muscles, emotions, nerves, to teach him to enjoy his work. It's no secret that the profession of a ballet dancer is an existence at the limit of human capabilities, everyday overcoming oneself, accumulated fatigue and stress.

- You were lucky enough to work with amazing people, do you have a desire to write a book about your life, rich and full of events?
- Collaboration with great masters, say with Maria Rambert or Maurice Béjart, was unforgettable and, of course, did not go unnoticed for me. Each of them -
extraordinary and bright personality. Working in troupes under the direction of Ninette de Valois, Frederic Ashton, Kenneth McMillan, Roland Petit, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Mats Ek, Jean-Christophe Maillot, I learned a lot and comprehended a lot.

I drive away the idea of ​​writing a book, because, unfortunately, there is absolutely no time for this, because work at the Mikhailovsky Theater occupies me without a trace.

— How does Russian ballet differ from Western troupes?
- They work more clearly, drier, in the troupe of the king there is iron discipline and order. A Western ballet dancer does not put as much soul and emotion into his dance as a Russian one. When I returned to Russia, many things surprised me, for example, freemen reigning in theater troupes.

— Mikhail Grigoryevich, you are the chief choreographer of the Mikhailovsky Theatre. How is a choreographer different from a choreographer?
And what are you currently working on?
- For me, a choreographer means the same thing as a choirmaster in an opera, that is, a person who helps the choir artists. A choreographer is a leader who tells ballet dancers the direction in which to move, helping the artist to become better and more professional. A choreographer is a dancer, a person who creates new movements.

When I was invited to Mikhailovsky, I staged several old concert numbers that the theater management liked. This is how our collaboration began. The next production was the ballet "Swan Lake". My first task, I considered the need not to repeat the productions of this performance, which are going on today on other stages of St. Petersburg. And he proposed the version of Alexander Gorsky - Asaf Messerer. Our production was highly appreciated by critics and viewers, which is very important. The professional growth of the Mikhailovsky troupe continues, we have excellent artists. I look forward to their continued success. I recently invited the young choreographer Vyacheslav Samodurov, Principal Dancer of the Royal Covent Garden Ballet, to the theater to stage a one-act play that is scheduled to premiere in July. We are also working on our own version of the Soviet ballet Laurencia in three acts by the composer A. A. Krein based on the magnificent choreography of the legendary dancer Vakhtang Chabukiani, whose centenary the dance world is celebrating this year. Not much of Chabukiani's production has been preserved, so I had to seriously work with the archive. The premiere of the performance is also planned for July this year. Next season we want to stage a contemporary ballet by the English choreographer Marriott. A distinctive feature of his compositions is the originality of the choreographic style. I think the performance will be interesting to our viewers.

- For some reason, it seems that the ballet absorbs the dancer entirely, perhaps this is an erroneous idea. What do you like to do in your free time?
— You are right, ballet, like any art, requires constant reflection and devotion. But I am a living person, and in different periods of life there are different interests.
I love cinema, literature. I bought a huge number of books in St. Petersburg, but there is no time to read. I read mostly during flights to London, where my family lives, or to Moscow. I am glad if the flight is delayed, because there is another opportunity to delve into reading. Every day I communicate with my son and daughter via the Internet, since modern technologies allow me to do this.

- You restored the Laurencia, now the Flame of Paris. What value do you see in pre-war Soviet choreography?

- Each of these ballets was a special, high point in the repertoire among other performances created during that period. "Laurencia" and "The Flames of Paris" are valuable in that they are well-tailored and tightly sewn, they are choreographically interesting, the language is talentedly chosen for each performance. But in principle, it is a pity to lose the ballets of that period because, without knowing one's past, it is difficult to move forward. It is necessary to move forward, but it must be done in such a way that future generations do not accuse us of doing this to the detriment of our own heritage. All over the world, national theaters remember their choreographers, honor them, and try not to lose their ballets. Take England, America, Denmark and so on. At some point, we lost a huge layer of performances, only the Bakhchisarai Fountain and Romeo and Juliet at the Mariinsky Theater survived. That is, from what happened over many decades of the development of Russian art under the communists, the majority simply disappeared. In my opinion, this is unfair. "Laurencia" and "The Flames of Paris" are also successful in that they have characteristic dances, there is the work of mimic artists, pantomime. Not a conditional pantomime of the 19th century, but a live dance acting game, to which the ballet theater came at that moment. It seems to me that it is useful for ballet dancers to remember and practice this. It would be a shame if the genre of character dance or the ability to act completely died out. Young artists have heard that there is such a thing as an acting image, but they don’t really know what it is. In addition, at that time many scores were written specifically for the ballet, but there are always not enough of them, there is always the question of what to stage. And another question about foreign tours - there is no need to explain how important they are for our theater: we took the classics to London, our Swan Lake, Giselle, and modern ballets by Nacho Duato and Slava Samodurov, but it is precisely those "damned drum ballets". "Laurencia" was received perfectly, and now they are waiting for our "Flame".

Ballet surname

Mikhail Messerer belongs to a famous artistic family. His mother, Shulamith Messerer, was the prima of the Bolshoi Theater in 1926-1950, then taught at the Bolshoi. For her performance of the title role in The Flames of Paris, she was awarded the Stalin Prize. In 1938, when her sister Rachel (silent film actress) was arrested, she took her daughter, Maya Plisetskaya, into the family. Mikhail Messerer's uncle, Asaf Messerer, was a famous dancer at the Bolshoi, and then a teacher and choreographer. Another uncle, Azariy Messerer, was a dramatic actor and director of the Theater. Yermolova. Mikhail Messerer's cousins ​​are the artist Boris Messerer and the teacher-choreographer Azary Plisetsky.

- There is such a point of view that what has remained for centuries is the best, there is no need to restore the destroyed. We just need to build something new. What do you think of it?

— It is necessary to build spacious modern buildings, but why destroy old mansions at the same time?! Build nearby. And so little of that period remains in ballet! I am not saying that it is necessary to restore all the performances of that time. But I wanted to return the highest achievements of the ballet art of those decades to a new life. I am not an expert, but it seems to me that in architecture some things of each period have been preserved - it never happened that everything was deliberately destroyed. And in this case, almost everything was destroyed, and simply because they decided that it was bad. Everything that has been done is bad. And it began to be considered that allegedly only from the sixties it started well. I strongly disagree with this. Much of what was done in the sixties did not become a classic, but simply outdated - unlike Laurencia, for example. As I have already said, Rostislav Zakharov's The Fountain of Bakhchisaray and Leonid Lavrovsky's Romeo and Juliet have been preserved at the Mariinsky Theatre. The audience enjoys these performances. When, in recent years, they gathered their strength and brought Romeo and Juliet to London, the success was gigantic. But two names are not enough. And I am glad that now we have managed to somehow improve the situation and recreate a number of performances. Six years ago I was invited to the Bolshoi Theater to stage Asaf Messerer's "Class Concert" - it was the idea of ​​Alexei Ratmansky. Then Vladimir Kekhman, General Director of the Mikhailovsky Theatre, asked me which Swan Lakes I knew (however, at first I offered him modern versions - Matthew Bourne, Mats Ek), and he chose the "old Moscow" Swan Lake, a performance of the same era. Then Laurencia arose from the idea of ​​​​celebrating the centenary of Vakhtang Chabukiani (I thought: what could be better than restoring the ballet of Chabukiani himself?).

- When before the war and after the war, the artists performed this performance on stage, do you think they correlated what was happening on stage with reality?

- Of course. In the thirties, many sincerely believed in the ideals of a bright communist future and took it seriously. Now one of the important tasks for me is to convince our artists to believe in the revolution when they are on stage. At least for those two or three hours that the performance is on.

- When you and your mother, the famous ballerina Shulamithyu Messerer, stayed in Japan, becoming "defectors" in 1980, did you think that someday you would study Soviet ballets?

“No, I couldn’t dream it in a bad dream, and I can’t dream it in a good dream either. But later, after thirty years of living in London, when he began to come to Russia to work, he asked: have you restored anything from that era? For example, I restored the Class Concert in the West, but what have you done? "Flame of Paris", "Laurencia" the same? It turned out that no, they did not restore it. It seemed strange to me - a gaping gap in history. But in 1980, no, I didn't think so. I understand that now my work looks like a paradox - after all, I left for freedom from communist dictatorship. But I distinguish between the political and the artistic sides of the matter. I hope that with my biography, no one will accuse me of sympathizing with that cannibalistic regime. But the most talented people at that time worked, such as Vainonen, director Sergei Radlov. Many were repressed, like Radlov or the librettist of The Bright Stream, Adrian Piotrovsky. No one ever knew whether they would give the Stalin Prize or send them to the Gulag, and sometimes both happened, and in a different order. I also perfectly understand what seas of blood were shed during the French Revolution, what a sacrifice the French people made on the altar of freedom, but it is no coincidence that the French celebrate Bastille Day every year. The ideals of equality are close to every European. And the ideas of fighting for freedom are eternal.

— The choreographer Vasily Vainonen, who staged The Flames of Paris in 1932, is practically unknown to the modern public, with the exception of The Nutcracker, which is shown at the Moscow Musical Theater and performed by students of the Vaganov Academy on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater. What do you think was the main thing in his choreographic style?

- Remarkable musicality, the ability to play with rhythms, amazing skill in varying musical accents, the ability to put on syncopations. Everything is simply and talentedly staged, and, of course, he has not lost touch with his predecessors - for me this is a very important quality: he has a thread with the work of Alexander Gorsky, Lev Ivanov, Marius Petipa.

- Did you dance in the Flames of Paris when you worked at the Bolshoi Theater?

- I participated in the “Flame of Paris” as a boy in a number that I have not deliberately restored now, because, in my opinion, today he would be superfluous. I played the role of a black girl in the ball scene in the royal palace, but now only Cupid dances to this music.

- As far as I understand, in the prologue you slightly changed the motivation - in 1932, the Marquis de Beauregard encroached on the honor of a peasant girl and arrested her father who stood up for her, now he orders to punish a man only because he collected firewood in his forest ...

— There were many variants of the libretto, Vainonen changed the play all the time — from 1932 to 1947. So, for example, in 1932 you can find a fragment where at the royal ball not only the Actress dances, but also the Singer, her understudy, sings, and exactly the same thing happens during the performance of the Actor. Gradually, everything changed and was reduced to some more compact form, in which it came to the time when I found this performance in the 60s - I saw it repeatedly and I remember Georgy Farmanyants, Gennady Ledyakh, I remember the first performance of Mikhail Lavrovsky. And now I've shortened something.

- What exactly?

- That episode at the beginning of the play, when the soldiers of the Marquis beat the father of the heroine - before they had arrested him and taken him to the castle, and the peasants and Marseilles broke open the gates with a log, took the castle by storm and freed him. There, even in the casemates, it turned out to be full of prisoners, they let everyone out, and the aristocrats who had hidden there were taken away on a cart, apparently to the guillotine. I omitted all this, thinking that Vainonen and Radlov in our time, too, would probably cut out this piece - it would look hard, but I wanted the performance to go on in one breath. In addition, there was practically no choreography.

- Oksana Bondareva and Ivan Zaitsev, who played the main roles in The Flames of Paris (though in different casts), have just triumphantly performed at the International Moscow Ballet Competition. Did they ask you?

— Yes, they asked for leave at the last moment. They did not have the opportunity to prepare comfortably, unfortunately, because Oksana was introduced for the role of Juliet and literally a couple of days after her performance, the competition had already begun. She rehearsed almost 24 hours a day, preparing for the competition almost at night. I warned her that it was dangerous - after all, her legs were not made of iron, but she believed in her victory. Well done, she won - and the winners are not judged.

- Many troupe leaders do not like it when their artists leave for the competition. Do you think competition in general is useful or harmful?

- Useful, I myself participated in competitions. By passing the competition, you become a better performer. This is especially important for those who believe that he does not go on stage often enough. This is an additional exam. Having passed this exam, you grow creatively, you believe in yourself more if you successfully danced.

- But if the artists danced successfully, is there always a chance that other theaters will drag them away from the leader?

— Yes, this aspect also exists. But I don't think about it now. Basically, artists do not leave us - they come to us. However, there were isolated cases when artists left our corps de ballet for a better position at the Mariinsky Theatre. They believed that I did not give them parties, and - "well, we'll go to the Mariinsky!" But we have a large corps de ballet - if the Mariinsky Theater needs help, you are always welcome, there are still extra ones.

By the way, Angelina Vorontsova came to you from the Bolshoi Theatre. Tell me, when did you first see her on stage and was there an idea to call her to the theater earlier, before this whole tragic story happened with Sergei Filin and the accusation of assassination of Angelina's boyfriend Pavel Dmitrichenko?

- I have not seen Angelina on stage before. And everything happened somehow at one moment: the school teacher Vorontsova turned to us, saying that Angelina had left the Bolshoi Theater - would we be interested in taking her? I was in Moscow and looked at Angelina. With our director Vladimir Kekhman, we discussed financial opportunities - can we accept a ballerina. He confirmed that yes, it is possible to do this, and the issue was resolved positively. I am pleased to. Vorontsova looks great on our stage. She is very good both as Jeanne and as an Actress. There is some kind of life-affirming energy in her, her art can be described by paraphrasing the poet: “When black thoughts come to you, Uncork a bottle of champagne. Or look at Angelina's dance."

- Angelina danced wonderfully at the premiere. But they told me here that she got into the first cast by pure chance, because a colleague who was supposed to dance this role, the role of a court actress who sympathizes with the insurgent people, wanted to improve her costume and accidentally ruined it so much that they could not restore it to premiere. How often does it happen in the theater that ballerinas change something without warning anyone?

- I will not comment on this case, but I will say that sometimes prima ballerinas and premieres allow themselves to adjust the costume. This happened and is happening in any theater in the world - starting with Vaslav Nijinsky. But I do not allow this, and in this sense there are no problems in Mikhailovsky.

- In all theaters of the world? That is, in« covent garden"Does this happen too?

- Someone tried to cut - and we, and in "Covent Garden" was, and in the Paris Opera, somewhere else. But these are the rarest cases. Rudolf Nureyev was seen doing this.

“Well, he ran the theater himself.

— No, even before he became a director. But such things just need to be done with the participation of the production designer. I always tell artists when they ask to change something in a costume: guys, this is not with me, this is first with the production designer. Maybe he will find the best option for you - so that you feel good and the performance too.

- At the same time, I have not heard an unkind word about you from any artist of your theater - in this case you are an exception to the theatrical rules. What is the secret of leading a troupe, how to make sure that you are not hated?

- People see when you treat your business with a soul, when you don’t breed a harem and when you care about artists and try to do good for everyone. And although it is impossible to do well for everyone in any case, but you need to try. That they love me is very strange. I'm pretty tough sometimes in my decisions. And artists understand this. Maybe they just value fairness.

- Firstly, it's true - we have very beautiful women in the troupe, and the men are not bad at all, and secondly, it will be easier for her to accept the remark.

- And if you are still very unhappy with a ballerina or dancer, can you shout?

No, I won't yell at a person. But there are times when people really don’t hear at a rehearsal, the microphone is junk, signalmen adjust it so that it is only audible in the hall, and I think that it is audible on stage, but it’s not. You just have to amplify your voice - after all, you often deal with a large group of performers. You don't have to yell at people. You can for a dog.

- Do you have a dog?

No, I don't practice.

- What should the chief choreographer of the theater never do?

- Scream. And you can’t be dishonest with the artists, because once or twice you, maybe, will deceive someone, and then no one will believe you. At the same time, you need to be diplomatic and pedagogical: it is fundamentally important not to offend people. The combination of these qualities is to be honest, open and at the same time try not to injure the psyche of artists, artists are sensitive people.

- And what must the chief choreographer do?

- For example, you have to attend performances, not everyone does it. It is necessary to know by heart the strengths and weaknesses of each member of the troupe. And we must try to make a schedule so that the artists do not overstrain and this does not affect their physical strength and psychological well-being.

— Most recently, Vasily Barkhatov was appointed director of the opera at the Mikhailovsky Theatre. Have you already met him and will you cross paths in your work?

- We were introduced to each other, but of course I knew about his work, I saw his work and recently congratulated him on the success of The Flying Dutchman in our theater. And of course, there are operas in which ballet participates, so I will soon collaborate more closely with him.

What will the next season bring?

- At the beginning of the season, we will start rehearsing the ballet "The Nutcracker" directed by Nacho Duato - the premiere will take place in December. After that, Nacho also promised to stage his famous ballet White Darkness - a ballet dedicated to his sister, who died of a drug overdose. "White Darkness" is cocaine. After that, we have plans that Vladimir Kekhman announced to the press the other day: in parallel with White Darkness, I would like to restore Konstantin Boyarsky's ballet The Young Lady and the Hooligan to music by Shostakovich. This is also a ballet of the Soviet period, which was created in our theater, and, in my opinion, also worthy. In addition, we would like to make a new version of Corsair with Katya Borchenko - our prima ballerina and, by the way, a phenomenal beauty woman - in the title role. And if there is time, we will put on the ballet Coppelia - the name that, in my opinion, should be played in our theater. As well as "Vain Precaution" - I would like to make the premiere of "Vain" in March. But it is not by chance that I use the subjunctive mood in a number of cases: plans will still be adjusted. The fact is that, unlike other theaters - Stanislavsky, Bolshoi, Mariinsky - there was no reconstruction of the backstage. We run into infrastructure limitations all the time. And they are simply forced to always do everything quickly and accurately, without wasting time in vain. If we had at least one more rehearsal room, it would be easier for us.

— Will your theater appear in Moscow or will it be possible to see the triumph of the French Revolution only by going to St. Petersburg?

- We are negotiating, so perhaps we will bring you something from our repertoire.

time keeper

Mikhail Messerer was born in 1948, graduated from the Moscow Choreographic School in 1968 (class of Alexander Rudenko) and joined the Bolshoi Theater troupe. He toured extensively with the Bolshoi and as a guest soloist with other troupes. In 1980, taking advantage of the fact that they ended up in Japan at the same time, Mikhail Messerer and Shulamith Messerer asked for political asylum at the US Embassy. After that, they settled in London and began working at the Royal Ballet of Great Britain. (In 2000, Elizabeth II granted Shulamith Messerer the title of lady for her work in English ballet.) In addition, Mikhail Messerer, as a teacher and expert on the Russian school, was constantly invited by the best theaters in the world - he taught at the Paris Opera, Bejart Ballet, La Scala, the main theaters in Berlin, Munich, Stuttgart, the Royal Swedish Ballet, the Royal Danish Ballet, Tokyo Ballet, the Chicago Ballet, the National Ballet of Marseille and other troupes. From 2002 to 2009 Messerer was a guest teacher at the Mariinsky Theatre. Since 2009 he has been the chief choreographer of the Mikhailovsky Theatre. In 2007, he restored Asaf Messerer's Class Concert at the Bolshoi Theatre. In 2009, he staged the legendary "Old Moscow" Swan Lake at the Mikhailovsky Theater (choreography by Marius Petipa, Lev Ivanov, Alexander Gorsky, Asaf Messerer), in 2010 - the ballet Laurencia (choreography by Vakhtang Chabukiani), in July 2013 - ballet Flames of Paris (choreography by Vasily Vainonen). Mikhail Messerer is married to the ballerina Olga Sabadosh, a former artist of the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Musical Theater, and now of the London Covent Garden Theatre. Olga and Mikhail are raising 13-year-old daughter Michelle and 4-year-old son Eugene.

The life of Mikhail Messerer, with its pace and unexpected twists, reminds me of a thriller. He kind of races through the fast lane, making instant decisions. Sometimes he makes mistakes, but more often luck accompanies him. I have often admired his resourcefulness and speed of reaction. I'll give one example:

On February 7, 1980, Mikhail leaves a hotel in the Japanese city of Nagoya at night, thinking over an escape plan. He knows that fate gave him and his mother Shulamith, an unusually courageous woman, a unique chance - by chance, due to an oversight of the KGB, they suddenly ended up together in capitalist country. By chance, because after the scandal with Alexander Godunov and his wife Lyudmila Vlasova (Godunov remained in the United States, and Vlasova was sent from New York to Moscow almost by force, after several days of confrontation with the American authorities at the airport), the KGB introduced an order: release artists abroad together with their families. In fact, it was meant to leave hostages in all cases. However, circumstances developed in such a way that when Mikhail came to Japan as part of the Bolshoi Theater troupe, Shulamith taught there at the Tokyo Ballet - it is not for nothing that she is called the mother of Japanese classical ballet. True, the artists of the Bolshoi in those days were touring in another Japanese city.

At night, Shulamith called her son and said: "Come." Leaving the hotel in Nagoya, Mikhail ran into a ballet dancer who served as a kegebesh spy: “Where did you go, looking at the night?” - he was alert, glancing at the plastic bag in Mikhail's hands. Personally, I, like many others, would not have found an answer in such a situation. Misha, that's how I'll call him in a relative way here, casually threw: "Hand over milk bottles." Such a seemingly unbelievable answer, oddly enough, reassured the security officer: he knew perfectly well that the artists received meager daily allowances, and they had to save literally on everything in order to bring gifts home, so empty bottles also went into business.

The escape of the seventy-year-old Sulamith and her son struck like a bolt from the blue. News releases on the BBC and VOA began with interviews given by the fugitives to reporters as they stepped off the plane in New York. Behind the Iron Curtain in Moscow, of course, I listened to their answers with great excitement. He noted that they avoided politics, repeating over and over again that they were not asking for political asylum - they were probably worried about us, relatives. The reason for their departure was called the desire to find more opportunities for free creativity in the West. Mikhail Baryshnikov, Natalya Makarova, and Alexander Godunov spoke about the same thing, however - they all condemned the stagnant atmosphere in Soviet art that hindered their creative growth. At the Bolshoi Theatre, for example, chief choreographer Yuri Grigorovich did not allow talented Western and Soviet choreographers to take part in productions, although he himself had long ago exhausted himself creatively and staged almost nothing new.

Of course, the escape to the West was a turning point in Misha's life. However, in my opinion, the most striking turn in his fate took place a quarter of a century later, when he, already a well-known ballet master teacher in the West, was invited to stage ballet at the Bolshoi Theater. Mikhail Messerer's new career in Russia developed so successfully that a few years later, while continuing to live in London, he became the chief choreographer of the Mikhailovsky Theater in St. Petersburg. Now he is free to put whatever he wants. However, his first productions at Mikhailovsky are restored classical Soviet ballets. Doesn't this contradict what he said in an interview with American reporters in 1980, doesn't he see a paradox here? It was from this question that I began to record a conversation with Misha on a dictaphone in the office of the chief choreographer in the recently restored Mikhailovsky Theater, which in 12 years should celebrate its bicentenary.

No, I see no paradox in the fact that I managed to revive the favorite works of my youth, such as "Class Concert", "Swan Lake" and "Laurencia". Arriving in Russia, I found a gaping gap here - the best performances created in almost 70 years of the existence of the USSR are lost. The stories of my recreating these few masterpieces are different in each case. For example, at the Bolshoi Theater they asked me to restore Asaf Messerer's "Class Concert" because I had already staged this performance in several Western countries: at the Royal Ballet School in England, at the La Scala Theater School in Italy, as well as in Sweden and Japan . Alexei Ratmansky, at that time the artistic director of the Bolshoi, adhered to positions similar to me: he believed that the best performances of that time should be revived from non-existence - if it is not too late.

In the second case, Vladimir Kekhman, general director of the Mikhailovsky Theatre, wished that a new version of the "ballet of ballets" - "Swan Lake" - would certainly appear in his repertoire. He asked me what version of the Swan I could recommend. In Mikhailovsky there was an idea to put on the same performance that is on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater. I said that I didn’t like this idea, because it was unreasonable to stage two identical performances in the same city, and began to list productions by modern Western choreographers: John Neumeier, Mats Ek, Matthew Bourne ... But Kekhman preferred to have Swan Lake in his repertoire told in the language of classical ballet. Then I mentioned that the good "Swan" was staged in Moscow by Alexander Gorsky-Asaf Messerer.

Didn't you know that in St. Petersburg for a long time they have been, to put it mildly, distrustful of ballets staged in Moscow? On the contrary, it has become a tradition that good productions appear first in St. Petersburg, and then transferred to Moscow.

Yes, that's true, but they invited me, knowing for sure that I represent the Moscow school, although I worked for thirty years in the West. Of course, I doubted that Kekhman would be interested in the so-called "old Moscow" performance. However, he, as a man of broad views, accepted this idea with enthusiasm. We decided to make the performance in the same scenery and costumes of 1956, in which it was shown during the historical tour of the Bolshoi in England. The West then first got acquainted with Swan Lake and Romeo and Juliet performed by a Russian troupe, and the Bolshoi Theater was a wild success.

We turned to the Bolshoi with a request to give us sketches of costumes and scenery for 1956 by the artist Simon Virsaladze, but we were told that all of Virsaladze's sketches were in the personal use of Yuri Grigorovich and were kept in his dacha. And that, alas, this dacha burned down along with its contents... But it was not for nothing that Mikhail Bulgakov wrote that "manuscripts do not burn." There is a film made by Asaf Messerer in 1957 with Maya Plisetskaya and Nikolai Fadeechev, and in this film, although short, all the characters of the play are shown. Our main artist Vyacheslav Okunev did a painstaking job: he copied costumes and scenery from the film frames. I myself have watched that performance many times and danced in it, so I can fully vouch for the accuracy of the restoration.

Here it is worth citing a few historical facts described in the program for this landmark production. We know about the great performance of Petipa-Ivanov, which was staged in St. Petersburg at the end of the 19th century. Nevertheless, for the first time "Swan" was still staged in Moscow, although it is not known for certain what that performance was. In 1901, Alexander Gorsky moved the St. Petersburg production to Moscow, but at the same time he created his own version. He later reworked his production many times, and Asaf Messerer took part in editing Gorsky's work. The performance was overhauled by Asaf in 1937, then in 1956, and it is this latest version that is now being staged in Mikhailovsky, and it is sold out. Half a century later, the performance returned to England and was shown in triumph at the London Coliseum, where Mikhailovsky took it in the summer of 2010.

As the saying goes, the beginning is always the hardest: following Swan Lake, you restored Alexander Crane's Laurencia, also contrary to tradition, moving the Moscow version of the production to St. Petersburg.

I started working on Lebedin as a guest choreographer only, so I couldn’t choose, I just suggested this option, while I already staged Laurencia as the chief choreographer. I really wanted to celebrate the centenary of the birth of the great dancer and outstanding choreographer of the Soviet period Vakhtang Chabukiani. At first, I planned to stage just one act, not even a whole act, but a wedding divertissement from it, restoring Chabukiani's choreography. The theater agreed that the idea was good, but it turned out that I had everything at my disposal for four weeks of rehearsals, and the theater was going to London at the end of the season, and the English impresario asked to bring another full-length classical performance. This congestion arose in my early days when I had just interceded. What to do? Invite some famous Western choreographer to stage a new performance? But who will agree to complete the order in such a short time? And if you put on a new performance, where can you find time to rehearse a concert in memory of Chabukiani? In frustration, I left the director's office, and then it dawned on me that the only way out could be to combine both projects - instead of one act, stage the entire performance of Laurencia and take it to London. And so it happened. The success in London was undeniable, the English critics nominated Laurencia for the best performance of the year, and then we reached the final of this competition. This is especially honorable, considering that Britain is famous not so much for its dancers as for its own choreographers, so for them to recognize a foreign performance as one of the best is a lot, and I was all the more pleased that the Bolshoi Ballet was performing in London in parallel with us. They received this award, but for performance achievements, and not for staging, although they brought four new performances.

It's amazing that your two previous productions were also nominated - for the honorary Russian prize "Golden Mask". True, they were only nominated, but not awarded it. Didn't that make you despondent?.. Especially when you consider that many Russian critics wrote about the blatant bias towards you of the jury members. For example, the critic Anna Gordeeva exclaimed: "Perfectionist Mikhail Messerer achieved such a quality of the swan corps de ballet that neither the Bolshoi nor the Mariinsky Theater could dream of it." And the journalist Dmitry Tsilikin wrote about the "symbolic and touching return to Moscow of its main ballet."

It was important to get a nomination - the Mikhailovsky Theater had not been nominated for the Golden Mask for many years, and the prize itself is a secondary matter. As you noticed, they wrote more about us, emphasizing the injustice of the jury, than about the laureates, who were mentioned briefly. So involuntarily you will conclude that sometimes it is better not to win. Articles in the press, high marks from experts, the excitement of the Moscow public... Tickets were instantly sold out. With speculators, they were worth $1,000 each (at a nominal price of $100); I know for sure, because I myself had to buy a ticket for such a fabulous price, because at the last moment I had to invite a friend whom I had not seen for ten years.

Of course, this success made me very happy, because we showed the performance in the city where it was created, and then undeservedly forgotten. By the way, I also invited the British choreographer Slava Samodurov, a former Russian dancer, to stage a one-act contemporary ballet at the Mikhailovsky Theatre, and this performance was also nominated for the Golden Mask.

Misha grew up early. At the age of 15, he experienced a tragedy - his father committed suicide. Grigory Levitin (Mikhail took his mother's surname) was a talented mechanical engineer who created his own attraction, in which he struck fearlessness - car-motorcycle races along a vertical wall. This attraction gathered thousands of spectators in the Gorky Central Park of Culture and Leisure and brought the "Moscow superman" a fortune. But he lived, as they say, on the edge of a knife, daily exposing himself to mortal danger. Misha blames everything on his young partner, brought up and trained by Grigory. Instead of gratitude, the partner set up an accident for his teacher in order to take possession of a profitable attraction (Grigory was sure of his guilt, although it was not proven). Grigory Levitin was seriously injured, forcing him to quit his job. Being out of work, he fell into a depression, and Shulamith did everything possible not to leave him alone. But on that fateful day, she could not miss the rehearsal of her senior class at the Bolshoi Ballet School, and there was no one to replace her at home for several hours. Recently, in an essay by Yuri Nagibin about Alexander Galich, I read the following words: “Levitin committed suicide in a fit of mental confusion. The daily risk shook the psyche of a strong, hard-hearted Superman, as if made of steel.

After the death of her husband, in order to drown out her heartache, Shulamith began to travel a lot around the world, giving master classes, since invitations came from everywhere - she was considered one of the best teachers in the world. Misha, of course, missed his mother, but his relatives supported him in every possible way. He was taken in by Rakhil Messerer-Plisetskaya, Sulamith's elder sister, and he was in close contact with her sons Azariy and Alexander, soloists of the Bolshoi. To some extent, older cousins, according to Misha, made up for the absence of his father for him. He shared with them his school experiences and worries, especially since they once studied at the same school, with the same teachers.

I used to visit their communal apartment in Shchepkinsky Proyezd, behind the Bolshoi Theatre, and I well remember how Misha told his older cousins ​​with ardor about the dances he had taken part in or seen at rehearsals. He expressively showed all kinds of pirouettes on his fingers, and his cousins ​​asked him clarifying questions. Already in those early years, Mishin's memory of the details of ballet choreography struck me.

If you have courage and enterprise from your father, then memory, one must think, from your mother?

I am far from my mother: she had a photographic memory, remembered a lot without any video recording, which simply did not exist at that time. And I have a selective memory: I remember well only what I like and, in fact, for the rest of my life. And if you are not interested, I remember very badly, well, maybe the essence, but not the letter. It was quite difficult to memorize the ballets at the Bolshoi precisely because I didn't like many of them. But, as it turned out, I clearly remembered what I liked, and after many years it came in handy.

You look quite young, but you already have the right to celebrate solid anniversaries. Remember how early you began touring the cities of the USSR, and before that you took part in performances staged by Shulamith in Japan.

Yes, it's scary to think that it was half a century ago... My mother staged The Nutcracker in Tokyo and occupied me in the play when I came to visit her. I was then 11 years old, and I danced the pas de trois with two Japanese girls from the Tchaikovsky school, which my mother founded in Japan. We toured with this performance in many cities of the country.

A few years later, at the request of my mother, who was still in Japan, her friend, the administrator Musya Mulyash, included me in a team of guest performers so that I would not be left alone in the summer. I was 15 years old, and I myself staged a solo variation to the music of Minkus from Don Quixote - I heard that Vakhtang Chabukiani danced a spectacular jumping number to this “female” variation, but never saw it. I performed it in concerts in Siberian cities, along with the adagio from Swan and Mazurka directed by Sergei Koren, which we danced with my young partner Natasha Sedykh.

With whom you were in love then, but many people prefer not to talk about their first love.

That's it. I must say that it was a difficult tour: some artists could not stand the stress and got drunk after the performances. The next morning they did not object to my suggestion to replace them, but then the more I could dance, the better.

You, as they say, were young, but early. And not only on stage, but also in pedagogy. Usually ballet dancers think about a teaching career when their artistic career comes to an end, and you entered GITIS, I remember, at the age of 20. Maybe the reason was the harassment by Grigorovich at the Bolshoi?

By nature, I am a perfectionist, so I was critical of my future as a dancer. At the Bolshoi, I danced several solo parts, for example, Mozart in the play Mozart and Salieri, but even this did not satisfy me, because I knew that Vladimir Vasilyev would not come out of me. Probably, Grigorovich also understood this - only now, being in charge of a large team myself, I can more objectively assess his actions. I, too, now have to refuse artists who dreamed of performing parts that were not suitable for them. True, Grigorovich could allow it in words, and when I asked the directors for a rehearsal room, they refused me, they say, the artistic director did not tell them anything. In my opinion, you should always be honest with artists, not prevaricate.

So, I really became the youngest student of the pedagogical faculty of GITIS. What prompted me to this decision was the reaction of fellow students to my lessons, because I tried to teach at school. When the teacher didn't come for illness or other reasons and most of the kids ran off to play football in the yard, a few people still remained, and I gave them a class that they clearly liked. And today, as then, in my youth, it is very important for me to know that my class is liked by those involved in it.

At school, I closely followed how my mother lined up her classes, watched the actions of other teachers - students of Asaf Messerer. I even found Asaf Mikhailovich himself at school during the last year of his teaching there. I was still in first grade, and we were not allowed to open the doors to other rooms, but a couple of times during the break they left the door open, behind which his senior class continued to study. I caught a glimpse of how he made remarks and showed how to dance. It made a huge impression on me. And in the future, when I, already working at the Bolshoi, studied for 15 years in the class of Asaf, I always tried on myself how, guided by his method, I would begin to teach on my own.

I was personally lucky to be in Asaf's class at the Bolshoi only once. I came to him as an interpreter for the famous premiere of the American Ballet Theater Igor Yushkevich. He then, like me, singled out only two dancers from the whole class - Alexander Godunov and you. And that was two years before your escape to the West.

Yes, I danced quite well then, but still I was already 31 years old when I stayed in Japan, and at that age it was already too late to start a career as a dancer in the West. As for Baryshnikov, Godunov and Nureyev, they were known in the West even before their escape and, of course, they possessed colossal talent. On the other hand, the Bolshoi's repertoire itself was not very conducive to my career in the West. For several years I danced the main roles familiar to me in the theaters of New York, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Indianapolis, but as soon as I was offered to teach with my mother at the Royal Ballet in London, I left the stage.

In pedagogy, you have clearly become a continuer of family traditions, you follow the methods of Asaf and Sulamith Messerer. You are also on a noble mission to preserve their artistic legacy...

The Moscow Messerer system is really close to my heart. I am very grateful to Asaf for the knowledge received from him and incredibly appreciate the great method of logical construction of the lesson created by him, and the ballet class is the basis of choreographic education. All his and mother's combinations of exercises were beautiful - from the simplest to the most complex, it would be more correct to call them small choreographic studies. And my mother's method also helped me a lot in conducting women's lessons. As you yourself saw, there are even more women in my class than men.

As for the creative heritage, in addition to Swan and Class Concert, I also restored Asaf Messerer's Spring Waters and his Melody to Gluck's music. Our artist Marat Shemiunov will soon dance this number in London with the outstanding ballerina Ulyana Lopatkina. And Dvorak's Melody, also staged by Asaf, is danced by Olga Smirnova, who is graduating from the St. Petersburg Academy, a very talented girl who, I think, has a great future. I am glad that these numbers were performed in our theatre, in particular, at the Gala Concert dedicated to the centenary of Galina Ulanova, the great ballerina who has been studying daily in Asaf's class for decades.

So, you have proved that you can restore old ballets with great precision, but what about the new productions?

Even in the old ballets, with all the striving to be scrupulously accurate, something had to be changed. For example, in The Swan, Asaf showed me a marvelous variation of the Prince, which he danced in 1921, but because of the difficulty - because then for many years no one could repeat it, she dropped out of the performance. I returned it, but other than that I made almost no changes to the 1956 performance. In Laurencia, on the other hand, I had to stage some of the dances myself, since much less material survived - for a long time no one was particularly concerned about the heritage. Unlike Swan, in Laurencia, a ballet in principle completely different, I did not set myself the task of restoring everything as it was, but tried to make a performance that would look good today, and retained about 80 percent of Vakhtang Chabukiani's choreography.

You know, restoring the old is akin to pedagogy. In class, I hone traditional technique and style of performance with the artists, and when restoring old ballets, I strive to preserve the style of the period and the style of the author. Moreover, so that it would be impossible to determine the seam, that is, to indicate where the original choreographic text is, and where my additions are. This work is extremely painstaking: you need to find recordings that often turn out to be of poor quality, clean up the old choreography so that the edges shine, but the main thing is to interest modern artists and the modern audience. I love this difficult task, but staging completely new ballets does not really attract me.

I spent several hours in your office and saw that you always have to solve a lot of all sorts of problems, to face unforeseen circumstances. Apparently, in your position, you can not relax for a minute.

In fact, every day brings something extraordinary. The main thing here is not to panic. In addition, I am an emotional person by nature, I can easily succumb to the mood, which in my position cannot be done in any way. Recently, for example, in the course of the performance, the leading lady Odette-Odile was injured. I watched the performance from the auditorium, that she would not be able to dance, I was told by phone literally three minutes before she went on stage. I realized that one of the soloists, dancing that evening in the Three Swans, knew the main part. I rushed backstage, told her that in a minute she would be dancing a variation of Odette. “But I have to go out in a trio!” she objected. "Let them dance together, and you will come out as Odette." The costume - a pack of Odette - is not much different from the packs of the Three Swans. I'm sure many in the public didn't even notice the change. And during the intermission, the girl changed into a black suit and danced Odile in the third act. But you treat such incidents as something for granted.

When I assumed the position of chief choreographer, we had only seven months left, after which we had to take the troupe on tour to London with an impressive program of four full-length and three one-act ballets. We worked all seven months like crazy, 12 hours a day. On the other hand, we really managed to show the troupe in a decent way, to get excellent press. I had to be extremely demanding of the artists, but they supported me. Unlike the artists of the Bolshoi and the Mariinsky, ours are not arrogant, but on the contrary, they approach their profession very consciously.

And the fact that you once ran away from the USSR did not interfere with your relationship with the artists?

I remember that one noble lady, a representative of the older generation, after the success of the “Class Concert” at the Bolshoi, was indignant: “Whom they applaud, he is a dissident!” I don't know if I was a dissident, but for the artists of the new generation, the term "dissident", if they heard it, in my opinion, does not have a negative meaning.

Chief choreographer of the Mikhailovsky Theater in St. Petersburg Mikhail Messerer (right) with director of the Mikhailovsky Theater Vladimir Kekhman (left), choreographer Vyacheslav Samodurov and ballerina Antonina Chapkina, 2011. Photo by Nikolai Krusser.

I know what a load is on ballet dancers today, so I try to defuse the situation, I call on humor to help overcome their fatigue. After all, the guys sometimes have to work 12 hours a day. I think it would be difficult even for shop assistants to stand for so many hours on their feet, what can we say about ballet dancers who are not only constantly on their feet, but, as they say, stand on their heads! Unfortunately, their hard work in Russia is not adequately paid.

And another thing: my mother often repeated that you need to do ballet only after the clamp is removed, when the body is in a free state. The atmosphere in the lessons and rehearsals should be quite serious, but at the same time light, relaxed.

It seemed to me during your class that every one of the more than 30 dancers was waiting for you to approach him and give him something important that would help him or her to dance at a higher level. And you were enough for everyone - you did not forget anyone. One artist, Artem Markov, told me later that he was “now it is very interesting to work, because the skills of the dancers are improving before our eyes and something new is happening all the time, which means that the theater is developing.”

I am sure that without an individual approach to each performer, not much can be achieved in a team. I consider it my duty not to distinguish between the artists in the class, to pay attention to everyone. Again, in this regard, I follow the example of Asaph and Shulamith Messerer.

Mikhail's respect and love for family traditions, as well as for traditions in general, naturally harmonizes with his surroundings. In London, he lives with his wife Olga, a ballerina at the Royal Opera House, and two children near Kensington Park, where the famous palace where Princess Diana lived with her sons is located. On my previous visits to London, we often went with Shulamith, my aunt, to this park, to look at the majestic swans, to admire the ponds, alleys, pavilions described in the poems of Byron, Keats, Wordsworth and other classics of English poetry. By direct analogy, next to the St. Petersburg theater where Misha works, there is a shady Mikhailovsky Garden. In spring, the scent of lime blossoms reigns there. Pushkin, and Turgenev, and Tolstoy, and Dostoevsky, and Chekhov liked to walk in the garden. Great Russian writers went to premieres at the Mikhailovsky Theater and wrote down their impressions of new operas and ballets in diaries. Today, Mikhail Messerer should be pleased to know that he can breathe new life into the works of ballet classics. u

Did you get a name in honor of your grandfather, who was a dentist, but became the founder of a theatrical dynasty?

Yes it is. He was an educated man, spoke eight European languages, did not know only English, and at the age of seventy-five he decided to read Shakespeare in the original, went to courses and learned English. Grandfather was fond of the theater, took his eight children to performances, who then acted out what they saw in their faces. His eldest son, my uncle Azary Azarin, became an actor and director, worked with Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko and headed the Moscow Yermolova Theater. The eldest daughter, Rakhil, was a silent film star, but left her career when she married and had three children with Mikhail Plisetsky, the Soviet consul in Svalbard, who was repressed and shot. Elizaveta Messerer was a talented comic actress. Asaf Messerer - an outstanding dancer of the Bolshoi Theater, and later a great teacher. At the age of sixteen, having visited the ballet Coppelia, he fell in love with this genre and, after studying for only two years, entered the Bolshoi Theater, immediately becoming its premiere. Ballet was also chosen by my mother, Shulamith Messerer, who became the prima ballerina of the Bolshoi Theater and People's Artist. Then my cousins ​​and cousins ​​came to art: the well-known Maya Plisetskaya, the outstanding theater designer Boris Messerer, the choreographers Naum Azarin, Alexander and Azary Plisetsky. Although Azariy and I are cousins, I treat him like my own. He has worked for many years as a tutor at the Béjart Ballet in Lausanne and gives master classes in many other companies.

Was the choice of profession predetermined for you?

My mother gave me to the choreographic school. It was a prestigious and well-paid job for a man: ballet dancers, unlike ordinary mortals, could travel abroad, had very decent money, they were given apartments in the center of Moscow. I was neither for nor against entering the ballet school, but once in it, I realized that it was mine.

Why did your mother give you her last name?

My father, Grigory Levitin, was a famous artist, he had his own circus attraction in the Gorky Park of Culture, where he raced motorcycles and cars along a vertical wall. I bore his last name, but at the school both teachers and classmates stubbornly called me Messerer - everyone knew that I was the son of Sulamith Mikhailovna and the nephew of Asaf Messerer. When I got my passport at the age of sixteen, my mom and dad decided to write me down as Messerer.

You were a dancer at the Bolshoi Theatre, but very early you decided to get an education as a teacher. Why?

I am a perfectionist. My career was developing successfully, but there were two giants of male dance nearby - Nikolai Fadeechev and Vladimir Vasiliev. I did not understand how other artists do not see their inferiority in comparison with them. At the same time, from the age of five, I watched my mother give lessons: there was no one to leave me at home with, and she took me to the class of the Bolshoi Theater. While still studying at the ballet school, I taught my classmates when the ill teacher did not come, and the guys loved these lessons. By the way, since then my task is precisely to make the lesson like the artists. Dancing at the Bolshoi, and as a guest soloist also at the Leningrad Kirov Theater, in Perm and Prague, I was just eager to be a teacher - I graduated from GITIS and at the age of thirty received the specialty of a teacher-choreographer.

In 1980, you and your mother ended up in Japan and never returned to the USSR. How did you come to this decision?

Of course, my mother and I discussed this for years: despite the presence of all material wealth, I wanted to be my own master, say what you think, go wherever you want. I came with the troupe of the Bolshoi Theater to Nagoya, and at that time my mother taught in Tokyo - she had been going there for many years, helping to create a ballet theater. She called me, said: "Come, let's talk," - and I understood from her intonation what was going to be discussed. Late in the evening I left the hotel with a small plastic bag in my hands, downstairs a man who worked for the KGB was on duty, who asked where I was going for the night looking. The answer came to my mind instantly, I said that I was going to hand over empty milk bottles - our artists also practiced this option of extracting currency. He did not know that I did not drink milk, and my answer satisfied him. At that time, there were no inscriptions in Latin in Japan and almost no one spoke English, I took the train to Tokyo only because I knew a little Japanese: I was a child in Tokyo with my mother, talked with the Japanese who visited her in Moscow. I came to my mother, we talked all night, and the next morning we went to the US Embassy. Mom had an invitation to teach in New York, at the American Ballet Theatre, we decided to take advantage of this opportunity and both received visas. We did not ask for political asylum, as was written about in the Soviet press. Mom taught all over the world, lived for ninety-five years. The champion of the USSR in swimming in her youth, she visited the pool every day until the last days of her life. I was immediately invited as a professor at the New York Conservatory of Dance, then I became a permanent guest teacher at the London Royal Ballet, giving lessons in almost all the leading ballet companies in the world. In the meantime, perestroika began, the Soviet Union was gone, and my friends more and more insistently called me to come to Moscow. At first it seemed impossible, but in 1993 the Russian consul brought me a visa right to Covent Garden, and I decided. In Moscow, I pinched myself every ten minutes to make sure I was awake, because before coming to Russia I could only dream of a nightmare. Then I met the ballerina Olga Sabadosh, fell in love, got married, now we have two children - a fifteen-year-old daughter and a six-year-old son. The daughter is studying in the UK, and the wife performs in Covent Garden.

Since 2009 you have been working at the Mikhailovsky Theatre. How do you manage to exist in two countries?

It's hard, but I try to go to London for at least two or three days every two weeks. Sometimes the family comes to visit me in St. Petersburg.

Preferring St. Petersburg to London, were you guided by the opportunity to stage performances here?

First of all, I am a teacher. Taking the position of chief choreographer, I set myself the task of raising the level of the troupe. I consider my productions from this perspective too: it is important that they give the artists the opportunity to improve, contribute to the growth of their professional skills. And of course, when preparing the performance, I think that it could be shown not only in St. Petersburg, but also taken on foreign tours.
For many years I gave master classes for the ballet of the Mariinsky Theatre. At one of the receptions in St. Petersburg, I met Vladimir Kekhman, who was looking for a version of Swan Lake to stage at the Mikhailovsky Theater and asked for my advice. I told him that the most important thing is not to make mistakes and not to take the same version that is on at the Mariinsky, theaters should be different. He offered to stage one of the Western versions - Matthew Bourne or Mats Ek. But Vladimir Abramovich believed that the classical production was more important at that time, and invited me to prepare with the troupe the so-called old Moscow version of Swan Lake, and in the process offered to become the chief choreographer. As life has shown, Kekhman made the right decision: we had great success with this ballet on tour in the UK, it became the first performance of the Mikhailovsky Theater nominated for the Golden Mask.

Now you are rehearsing "Corsair". In what edition will it go to the theatre?

The performance was staged in 1856 in Paris by Joseph Mazilier, then staged many times in Russia, and the most famous is the version of Marius Petipa, which has survived to this day in several editions by other choreographers. In 1973, the wonderful master Konstantin Mikhailovich Sergeev gave a new life to the Corsair. His elegant performance, unfortunately, could not be seen in St. Petersburg for many years: the Mariinsky Theater is now performing Pyotr Gusev's version, created by him in the 1950s - by the way, for MALEGOT, that is, the current Mikhailovsky. And we chose the Petipa-Sergeev edition. But I do not consider it necessary to make an absolutely exact copy of this performance. Life is changing, in order for the ballet to look interesting, you need to put yourself in the place of the directors and imagine what they would come up with today. If a ballet performance is not updated, it dies. Petipa staged Giselle in a new way, and Vakhtang Chabukiani and Vladimir Ponomarev edited La Bayadere, as a result, both ballets are alive. The same "Corsair" still exists because it was remade by different choreographers. It is for this reason that we decided not to restore the "historical" scenography and lighten the visual range - we will have light costumes and minimalist scenery.

The abundance of editions is typical for many classical ballets, but there is no other such number of composers' names on the poster.

Yes, as more and more new choreographers added more and more insert numbers to the ballet, the list of composers-“co-authors” also grew. Adan, Delibes, Drigo, Puni and a few lesser known ones got into it. All names will be listed on our poster.