The ideal romantic partner

Before embarking on Julie Kavanagh’s magnificent Nureyev, I had recently the pleasure of reading Richard Buckle’s The Adventures of a Ballet Critic. This passionate and witty memoir (a book so obsessively driven by the author’s love of dance, I defy anyone to read it and not be intoxicated by this love) gives a wonderfully vivid picture of the English ballet scene after the war. The main characters featured among the dramatis personae include Fred (Ashton), Billy (Chappell), Bobby (Helpmann), Margot (Fonteyn), and Madam (Ninette de Valois). You get the feeling this rather cosy and oh-so-naughty group with their private jokes and schoolgirly tiffs could be amusingly transformed into the comedic world of Ronald Firbank, where these fey men, enthralled by a dark beauty, Fonteyn, are strictly dominated by a rather stern and reproving de Valois.

This is how it was before Nureyev. For when, after a brilliant season by the Kirov in Paris, Nureyev sought refuge in the West, and leapt to freedom — or, as he insisted, in fact walked — Fonteyn invited him to appear at her Royal Academy gala, Ashton choreographed his solo, and de Valois cleverly realised she had to coax the young star into joining the Royal Ballet. Nothing, as Kavanagh points out, was ever the same again.

Nothing was certainly ever the same for those of us who were lucky to be members of the audience, when Nureyev exploded onto the Opera House stage, for besides demonstrating his outlandish showmanship, his ardour in partnership and great physical beauty, he brought something we had not seen much of in those portals — sex.

Male British dancers were personified chiefly by Helpmann, a virtuoso performer with a strong tendency for exaggeration, i.e. camp, or Michael Somes, Fonteyn’s very fine partner, who was effective but a little buttoned up.