Here comes Rasputin

Royal Opera House, Covent Garden , London

I went to see Anastasia, the ballet by Kenneth MacMillan at the Royal Opera House, on a very cold Guy Fawkes night, when people were out and about to watch firework displays and to take part in the Million Mask march. In other words, bad traffic in Central London.
I went specially to see Eric Underwood in the role of Rasputin, I am a fan of the Royal Ballet soloist turned part time model (elsewhere I wrote he was a principal, but the programme I bought lists him as a soloist, ballet has a rigid hierarchical structure).
I was not the only one there to see Underwood, the woman sitting next to me had come for the same reason. Underwood, a phenomenal dancer,  is making ballet more accessible to communities that would not usually engage with it, deeming it as a wholly white upper middle class art form. As a ballet lover, I feel ballet ought to be appreciated by all, thus I applaud Underwood for being a fantastic dancer and for being a role model (no pun intended). I was also keen to see Federico Bonelli, he is another talented ballet dancer hailing from Turin, Italy, like Roberto Bolle. In fact, Bonelli substituted Steven McRae who was indisposed. Some audience members were disappointed at this last minute change.
We had  stalls circle right seats, which was not as bad as I initially thought, though being on one side meant that occasionally we would not be able to see the action on upstage left (and we could not see the black and white film that was projected during act III, footage of the Romanov).
I had never seen Anastasia before. It is a ballet based on the story of Anna Anderson who spent her entire adult life purporting to be the Grand Duchess Anastasia, daughter of the last Tzar of Imperial Russia. She claimed she had survived the summary execution by the Soviet soldiers through the help of a faithful officer and had escaped to Germany where she was found wandering the streets of Berlin in a state of confusion. She was then admitted to an asylum. After a rather eventful life which brought her fame (or infamy, depending on how you view it), she was finally proved to be an impostor in 1984, following a DNA test, which some discredited as having been tampered with.

Grand Duchess Anastasia circa 1908, photo Library of Congress as reproduced in the programme, ROH

Anna Anderson/Anastasia had many supporters  but many more enemies. Not everyone believed her and many were keen to unmask her as a fraud. She was not a fraud as such, she was a woman affected by mental illness. One feels sorry for her and her mental confusion. Anna Anderson genuinely believed she was the Grand Duchess.
MacMillan was inspired by her story, after seeing the film starring Ingrid Bergman and went on to create the ballet. I always feel ambivalent about MacMillan, his ballets have wonderful moments and then there is much which leaves me rather mystified.  I love The Prince of the Pagodas for example, even though it is far too lengthy and could have done with a cut or two. Anastasia is frankly two ballets into one, and there are very long intervals too - good for the bar, someone said, and in the last act a few people in the audience were, shock horror, as act III is the most dramatic one, nodding off, having had a glass too many.  Which makes me wonder why some people bother to go to the ballet and spend £ 60 on a seat when they could drink somewhere else.
But yes, Anastasia could have been condensed into a long one act ballet giving much greater prominence to act III which is about the confusion experienced by Anastasia and which was so superbly danced by Lauren Cuthbertson as Anna Anderson, Eric Underwood as Rasputin and Thomas Whitehead in the role of Anna Anderson's peasant husband.

Rasputin circa 1910, Photo Library of Congress as reproduced in the programme, ROH.

Rasputin is a key character in MacMillan's ballet. MacMillan turns him into a haunting figure, a symbol of decadent Imperial Russia, a devilish schemer. It is as if the confusion that tears Anastasia/Anna apart in her reimaginings, is caused by him, he becomes her mental illness. Underwood is superb as Rasputin, even though physically he is much taller and imposing than Rasputin ever was. According to those who met him, Rasputin was a scrawny, somewhat ugly man whose power was in his eyes and the way he held his gaze, as well as in his hypnotic voice, something which is lost in the ballet for the audience cannot see  the dancer's eyes nor hear the dancer's voice, but Underwood has such a presence, through sheer stillness and through his tall figure he can convey the essence of Rasputin. For two long acts he simply stands, occasionally lifting a few ballerinas - my companion and I were a little disappointed, we wanted to see Underwood  break into a dance even though we fully understood that this was the interpretation he had to give to the character to bring it to life.  Then in act III he dances and in his movements, deliberate and intense, he becomes  the haunting figure that exacerbates Anastasia's mental confusion.  He is the darkness of Anastasia's mind.
I loved act III and all the performers were absolutely amazing, throughout the whole ballet, the dancers of the Royal are such wonderful professionals, they never disappoint. Young Rory Toms in the role of the hemophiliac Tzarevitch Alexei was absolutely charming.

St Petersburg in winter. Photo by me

But Anastasia as a ballet does not do it for me. I find Rasputin is a fascinating, most intriguing and very complex character and I am not entirely happy at the way MacMillan somewhat stereotypes him. Mystic, faith healer, charlatan, womaniser, drunkard, sharp, astute, power hungry, adored and also despised by women and men, Rasputin remains one of the most enigmatic figures in history, a Siberian peasant who established an intimate connection with the Tzar's family, especially the Tzarina and the Tzarevitch and was then brutally assassinated. Underwood through his stillness and the intensity of his performance is able to inject a little of Rasputin's mystery into MacMillan's annoying eminence grise in act I and II, not to mention the sheer power of his dancing in act III and this is quite an achievement.
Rasputin's story, however, remains untold.