On Tuesday 11 April, the Teatro Colón Ballet, directed by Mario Galizzi, splendidly inaugurated its 2023 season with Swan Lakethat enduring title in the academic repertoire that always draws crowds across the planet: those who have seen it perhaps more than a hundred times in their lifetime, those seeing it perhaps for the first time.
Different and very solid dancers from the Teatro Colón They followed each other in these ten days in the main roles of Odile/Odette and Prince Siegfried. The cycle closed with one of the most dazzling, moving and memorable interpretations of the double role of the Swan Woman that people remember from this work, interpreted over time by many stars in the history of ballet.
It was the guest artist Marianela Núñez, Argentinian and prima ballerina of the Royal Ballet of London, who performed the miracle of giving it new life and new meanings, of dazzling power and subtlety, to its two diametrically opposed characters: on the one hand the innocent, shy and sensitive Odette, a princess transformed into a swan by an evil sorcerer; she regains her human form every night and is discovered in this condition by Prince Siegfried.
Both fall in love and Siegfried’s oath of love will break the spell.
From on the other side is Odile, the black swandaughter of the sorcerer and as seductive as she is wicked: her father gave her the appearance of Odette to deceive Siegfried and that the spell remains.
Who was Marianela’s Siegfried?
Marianela Núñez also had the invited artist as a partner Kimin Kim, principal dancer of the Kirov Ballet in St. Petersburgexceptional performer in the role of Siegfried, technically brilliant and very good company.
But as in all roles in romantic and post-romantic ballets, so too in this one Swan Lakeby Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov on the beautiful score by PI Tchaikovskythe undoubted weight is placed on the female character, or in this case, on the two female characters.
Thus, a single dancer, in most of the existing versions, plays the double role.. A very difficult challenge: from the second act, with the trembling Odette who discovers love in the dark of the night, she has to move on to the third act, transforming herself into an evil and powerful Odile in the middle of a party at Prince Siegfried’s court.
After seeing Marianela Núñez in the second act, following with bated breath all the nuances, the expressions, the sublime moments that this dancer reaches, it is inevitable to say to yourself as a spectator: “Well, with this I already have enough to leave the theater happy; If the Black Swan in the third act isn’t up to the job, it doesn’t matter.”.
And not! Marianela Núñez’s El Cisne Negro is at the same height with an absolutely opposite expressive register: a dominant and provocative character.
The immeasurable talent of Marianela Núñez
It would be easy to talk about Marianela Núñez’s superhuman technique: her balance control, her weightless leaps, her perfect curves, the way all her movements seem to “breathe”. But more significant it is how he uses his technique and the depth and thickness his interpretation achieves. That’s what art is.
Marianela Núñez was trained at the Teatro Colón Art Institute and very young he entered the Royal Ballet of London; You have developed your entire career there but, in addition, you are a guest star in many international companies.
In 2022, the prestigious UK Critics’ Circle, which awards dance awards in several categories, awarded Marianela Núñez the accolade for “Best Dancer”. They had already chosen her four times: in 2002 as a “promised youngster” and then in 2005, 2012, 2018 in as many categories.
On the occasion of the 2022 award, she was interviewed by this reporter through Zoom inand in one passage he referred to Swan Lake. Days earlier, she had uploaded a test video of this work with the London company to her networks.
She said, “Something amazing happens to me with Lake…: how a ballet can cause such extreme things as it does to me. Sometimes I think about what will happen to me when I don’t dance it anymore. It demands so much of you; hours and hours and hours looking for details, to understand these two opposite characters. I feel an intense love for this job and at the same time many fears and insecurities that they should have led me to escape. But no, I’m getting more and more attached to it.”
“It always makes me nervous. And getting worse. The first time I danced was in 2005 and at first I was uncomfortable the day before. Later, several days before. Now, maybe already in the three weeks leading up to the premiere, the scare begins. But when I make that first Odette run, I jump and I come, the fullness I feel is incomparable”.
“I can’t say which of the two roles I prefer; both create the same love and insecurity for me. The first time I danced it here, at the Royal, they told me: ‘With the technique you have and your temperament, Odile will not cost you’; but I have always felt very close to Odette as well”.
The swan is yapa
The Teatro Colón has added another function to those already scheduled. It will be this Tuesday the 25th at 8pm. Marianela Núñez will be accompanied by Federico Fernándezprincipal dancer of the company.
Source: Clarin
