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THE TROCKS
LES BALLETS TROCKADERO DE MONTE CARLO
STATE THEATRE, VICTORIAN ARTS CENTRE OCTOBER 2-6, 2002
Reviewed by BLAZENKA BRYSHA • www.bbdance.com.au

Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo are the true custodians of ballet's great tradition. They're also very good at shaking the chassis, as they proved with their encore finale to Wednesday night's opening of their current season.

While the audience was still cheering the show's closing number, Raymonda's Wedding, a spinning disco ball was lowered into view over the stage and the dancers hit the floor, hoofing their way through some smooth moves. Only the Trocks could manage a foray into 20th century popular dance styles while still wearing tutus and pointe shoes.

Maybe we can look forward to some rock and roll, disco and rap on future visits by the Trocks. The current program limited itself to hardcore ballet, dating from 1844 to 1905, with which only an all-male parody company could get away. As they say, it's not what you do but how you do it -; and the Trocks do it superbly.

Fokine's Les Sylphides, the first-ever abstract ballet and an agonizingly difficult work to perform well, is given a radical treatment with a revitalized approach that emphasises the human dynamic in expressive dance. Did I notice Fifi Barkova chewing gum? Or was it one of the other husky lasses? Really, girls, that's just going too far.

A pas de trios from Le Corsaire, a pas de six from La Vivandiere and The Dying Swan, danced with much feeling by Ida Nevasayneva (Paul Giselin), completed the bill.

The disproportionate pairings of towering or chunky ballerinas with short or scrawny danseurs, made me wonder what David Parkin, Carlton's ex-coach, would have made of this use of "your talls and your smalls". For me, it worked although I'm not sure that the hapless Vladimir Legupski (Raymell Jamison), who languished under the mass of Margeaux Mundeyn (Yonny Manaure) would agree.

POST SCRIPT
The Trocks' formula is simple: take one troupe of male dancers who have a strong ballet technique as well as performance flair, make them pretend they are an émigré Russian company, give them a repertoire of iconic ballet works and get them to dance it well.

In fact, the Trocks dance so well that during last night's performance of Les Sylphides, I kept thinking, "I hope the rest of the show doesn't feature almost all girls…". I wanted to see more of the company's men. Oddly enough, I have often had this thought: during the early 1980's Saddler's Wells Royal Ballet, later that same decade during visits by both the Kirov and the Bolshoi and most recently during the English National Ballet's arena productions.

Unfortunately, the Trocks mirror reality just a bit too much. Apart from genuinely enjoying the show -; I was the one laughing deafeningly during any hint of slapstick -; I had some confronting issues thrust in my face.

The first is the question of costume. Why does Manolo Molina look like a chunky matron when he is in the Fifi Barkova tutu and like an elfin prince when he togs out as Igor Slowpokin? This is a goldmine of psychological research into expectation, perception and reality. To give Molina credit, he is a masterful showman with a flair for characterization.

The second question is to do with repertoire. The Trocks are to be lauded for their efforts in dusting down museum pieces and giving them life. Maybe they're telling the rest of the world's ballet companies something about the need for balance between historical accuracy and spontaneous vitality.

In retrospect, I wondered whether the pas de six from La Vivandiere had been danced too much in the Classical style at the expense of the detailing required by Romantic interpretation, which is historically more appropriate to this piece. But does it matter? NO. The rendition was alive and it never occurred to me that I was actually watching one of ballet's antiquities. Mind you, the billing of "ballerina -; Nadia Rombova with Igor Slowpokin" translated onto the stage and said more about the nature of Romantic

Ballet than a myriad stylistic affectations could convey. From her great height, Rombova (Jai Williams) made it clear that Slowpokin was an insignificant factotum, a mere porteur.

It is often noted that Les Sylphides, with its traditional dim lighting and delicate shading would be lost on today's audiences. Ironically, The Trocks bring the very sense of freedom and individuality that made the work such a groundbreaker in the first place. I missed some of the bits that got big laughs because I was concentrating on the beautiful ensemble work behind the soloists. The best moments came when the dancers were resting their personas momentarily and just feeling the steps.

And finally -; this came as a big shock -; some of the audience laughed at various authentic Petipa steps during the variations in Raymonda's Wedding. The piqué steps accompanied by pronounced hip thrusts and hand movements rotated from the wrist, are a bit funny, I admit.

Perhaps the Trocks can start a Trocks 2 troupe that specializes in sending up legendary dancers. In Australian Rules football we have concepts such as "Team of the Century" which consists of using various methods to draw up a list of the best footballers -; forget the original team and date of career -; and give them positions on an imaginary team. Sometimes, some of the footballers are still alive.

So, how about a Trocks 2: "Megastars of World Ballet" that features Nijinsky, Baryshnikov, Nureyev, Dolin, Anthony Dowell, Erik Bruhn, Peter Martins, Pavlova, Fonteyn, Markova, Makarova, Spessitseva, Ulanova, Alonso, Fracci, Besmertnova, Plisetskaya, Karsavina -; just to name a few.

You'd want to be careful though, because Plisetskaya would probably insist on doing herself.

Reviewed by BLAZENKA BRYSHA • www.bbdance.com.au

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