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photo by Tina Eshleman
Ma Xiaodong and Wang Ye rehearse Act 1 in "Don Quixote."
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photo by Tina Eshleman
Maggie Small portrays street dancer Mercedes, and Fernando Sabino is lead matador Espada in "Don Quixote."
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photo by Tina Eshleman
The Richmond Ballet rehearses "Don Quixote."
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photo by Tina Eshleman
Fernando Sabino as lead matador Espada in Richmond Ballet's "Don Quixote"
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photo by Tina Eshleman
Richmond Ballet rehearses Act 1 of "Don Quixote."
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photo by Tina Eshleman
Ballet master Malcolm Burn works with Chinese dancers Ma Xiaodong and Wang Ye as Richmond Ballet rehearses "Don Quixote."
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photo by Tina Eshleman
Stoner Winslett, the Richmond Ballet's founding artistic director, with Chinese guest artists Wang Ye and Ma Xiaodong.
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photo by Tina Eshleman
Ma Xiaodong and Wang Ye of the National Ballet of China, after rehearsing a scene from "Don Quixote."
“The Road to China started on Canal Street,” Richmond Ballet artistic director Stoner Winslett says while introducing a recent open rehearsal for the upcoming Don Quixote production. Events are getting a huge boost with the ballet’s annual gala on Feb. 28, themed as a Chinese New Year celebration with a centerpiece of an ornate Chinese pavilion.
Right after this announcement, the studio’s automated black shades rise, with a whir and crackling — a bit like sputtering fireworks. The sun at this time of day can blast into the building and right into the dancers' eyes.
The Richmond Ballet's version of Don Quixote, using Nicholas Beriozoff’s choreography and featuring two principal dancers from the National Ballet of China, opens tomorrow and runs through Sunday (Feb. 20 to 22) at the Carpenter Theatre.
Cervantes’ sprawling and multi-layered story is considered the first modern novel in large part because of its quality as an “anti-romance.” That is, the narrative takes in everyday concerns and the lives of ordinary people are juxtaposed against the romantic fantasies of the “knight errant,” Don Quixote, and Sancho Panza, his earthier sidekick. Don Quixote broke away from the usual narratives of 400 years ago, and remains an enduring work.
The ballet’s subject concerns Quixote wandering into people’s lives and bringing a sense of grand importance to everyday matters. And thus, there is romance, after all.
In this piece, “the knight of doleful countenance” gets into a love triangle between feisty Kitri (portrayed by Wang Ye), the poor-in-materials-but-rich-in-emotions, Basilio (Ma Xiaodong), and Gamache (Matthew Frain), a lively and silly nobleman who wants Kitri for his own.
photo by Sarah Ferguson, Richmond Ballet 2015
Cody Beaton and Maggie Small in rehearsal for the Richmond Ballet's "Don Quixote"
This rehearsal introduces the village characters at the top of Act I. The dancers wear customary dance outfits, not stage costumes, and the music (with applause), comes from another recording of the show, but, the presentation is nonetheless exhilarating to watch, with the troupe in perpetual motion, whether flicking fans, clapping, engaged in stage business with a guitar, or making fun of the foppish Gamache by imitating his flouncing swagger.
Ballet master and associate artistic director Malcolm Burn advises the observers that since this is a rehearsal, there could be stopping and starting, but no such pause occurs. While action flurries about up front, Burn works in the corner, pointing up some gestures with Chinese dancers Wang Ye and Ma Xiaodong. How the two are managing to stand upright at all – given that they’d been in Richmond barely a day and a half after traveling from the other side of the world — was, at least to the layman, remarkable. The ballet corps started rehearsing on Jan. 19, without their Chinese guest artists.
The two were supposed to have come a week prior to this open rehearsal, but after members of the National Ballet of China suffered injuries, Ma and Wang needed to fill in for them. The pair's first rehearsal with the Richmond Ballet was the previous day.
That they could so readily join in is due to their backgrounds as exquisitely trained artists. Wang received her ballet training at the Shanghai Academy of Drama and joined the national troupe in 2003. Her classical repertory includes lead roles in Swan Lake and Giselle and the role of Olga in Onegin.
Ma likewise is a principal dancer with the National Ballet of China. He graduated from the
photo by Sarah Ferguson, Richmond Ballet 2015
Ma Xiaodong (left) and Wang Ye rehearse for the Richmond Ballet's "Don Quixote."
Beijing Dance Academy in 2009, and joined China’s national company that same year. Ma’s classical repertory includes leading roles Don Quixote, La Bayadere, Firebird, Études,Swan Lake and The Nutcracker, and Chinese classics including The Red Detachment of Women, The Yellow River and the new ballet A Letter to My Wife.
“This shows us how dance is an international language,” Burns observes. “Despite the language barrier, they’re fitting in beautifully.”
Wang and Ma are familiar with Rudolf Nureyev’s technically demanding Quixote; the more theatrical Beriozoff version is different for them, but enjoyable and offers its own challenges. Shadowing the the Chinese dancers as Kitri and Basilio are Richmond Ballet company members Cody Beaton and Trevor Davis. Shira Lanyi, on leave from the company this season, returned from Israel to perform the role of the Queen of the Dryads.
The Road to China is taking the Richmond Ballet to the 15th Annual "Meet in Beijing" Arts Festival in May at the National Centre for the Performing Arts ("The Egg"). The company's first journey into Asia follows its first international tour in June 2012, featuring a successful debut at the Royal Opera House's Linbury Studio Theatre in London.
None other than Malcolm Burn will portray the “knight of the doleful countenance.” In a 1985 Richmond Ballet Don Quixote staging, Burn assayed the role of the barber. Of the visiting dancers, he says, “I suppose such an arrangement could be difficult – except that these are two delightful people.”
