I recently chatted to Elik Melikov, director of the ‘Moscow Ballet las Classique’ due to tour Australia this month, including a tour date in Devonport.
Elik is a vibrant fixture in the ‘Moscow Ballet Las Classique’ a company he has been working with for 23 years and who he sees as family.
It was ten years ago that Elik was last in Tasmania and he hopes that this visit will provide some warmer weather, or at least preferably warmer, to the freezing cold of the UK where the company, at the time of our chat were completing their present tour. They had 2 more weeks in the UK touring with Copellia and then returning to Moscow for two weeks of rehearsal before making their way to Australia for their gala concerts.
This visit the company will showcase one of three great Tchaikovsky ballets, The Nutcracker, the other two being Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty.
The Nutcracker is a perennial favourite and although it was initially performed for the Russian king and his family at Christmas time Elik believes it is a play for any time of the year, spring or summer, and it appeals to older and young people alike as well as to to any culture or country.
The female protagonists name is Maria but in the west we know her as Clara, the little girl who gets a beloved nutcracker doll as a Christmas present and in a series of dreams sees him take form into a flesh and blood prince who battles mice armies and escorts Clara to magical kingdoms including a kingdom of sweets where she and her prince are created King and Queen.
Clara wakes from these supposed ‘dreams’ but we are left guessing, when beside our heroine lies a little crown proving to us the dreams are in fact visions of the future.
Elik is more than a director, although trained in dance, Elik says he would ‘make like a painter’. Indeed he has a qualification from Art school and is instrumental in designing the beautiful costumes for this production. Elik’s name means ‘defender’, and like the nutcracker defending Clara from the mice army and other forces, Elik with his beautiful realisation of costume and art and devoted direction is a defender of ballets prominence as an art form. Elik is eager to return to Australia in the not too distant future bringing us more productions of the Moscow Ballet.
You can see ‘the Moscow Ballet las Classique’ at Devonport Entertainment & Convention Centre on Saturday April 20 and Princess Theatre, Launceston on Sunday April 21.
Paula Xiberras
