Boston Ballet's 'Onegin'

Dramatic crescendos, unrequited love, and payback all mark Boston Ballet's extraordinary "Onegin," playing at the Boston Opera House through March 6. Choreographed by John Cranko, it premiered at the Stuttgart Ballet in 1965. Cranko melded classic Russian ballet fundamentals with muscular lifts and leaps to form a fast-moving, heart-wrenching melodramatic dance. Based on the poetic tale of Alexander Pushkin's 1820s verse novel "Eugene Onegin," it is set in Imperial Russia. Weirdly, like his lead character in his story, Pushkin would later die in a duel fueled by sexual jealousy.

The bare bones of the narrative are familiar to readers of romances. Bookish Tatiana falls for bad boy Onegin who quickly abandons her. Later, to be mean, he lures her sister Olga away from her fianc�, who challenges the cad to a disastrous duel. Tatiana eventually marries the loving Prince Gremin and when Onegin comes back for more, she fights off the memory of those early endorphins and turns him down.

The three acts all open with the front curtain featuring an oval-framed portrait of Pushkin, and waiting behind are grand sets that take us into aristocratic compounds and lush forests.

On opening night, Principal Dancer Petra Conti's initial delicacy and shyness as Tatiana contrasts with her flushed exhilaration after her off-stage but palpable first encounter with romantic excitement. Principal Dancer Lasha Khozashvili's portrayal of Onegin drips with a predatory and dark arrogance. His hair is black, his clothes are black, and he is a scowling cloud in a pastel and gilt world. When he returns, his hair has turned grey, while Tatiana has flowered.

The secondary couple has contrasting personalities. Tatiana's sister Olga, danced that night by Ashley Ellis with ebullience and confidence, is attached to her gentle poet fianc� Lensky, danced with warmth by Patrick Yocum. While Tatiana is buried in her romance novel, Olga is showing off her new dress, cavorting playfully among the young people of their village. When the guys arrive, we are treated to Russian folk dancing, a surprise bauble from Cranko, before the couples fly in an astonishing train of leaps and lifts across the stage. This was one of the high moments for me of the performance.

In a remarkable second scene of Act I, Tatiana falls asleep after writing Onegin a love letter, and dreams of him entering her room and dancing with her. Conti's work here is as light as the chiffon of her nightdress.

In Act II our dislike of Onegin expands as he sits playing solitaire in the middle of Tatiana's birthday party while she pines for his attention. Instead, he cruelly flirts with her sister Olga. Olga brushes off the impact this is having on both Tatiana and Lensky, until the latter forces a duel. The music climbs to a circulation-stopping crescendo.

In the final Act, Onegin turns up years later for a ball at the home of Prince Gremin and when he discovers that Tatiana is married to the Prince, he writes her a love letter. Conti's portrayal of the painful conflict she feels when Onegin approaches her privately is outstanding, and when she holds her honor together and rejects him, it is a moment of aching triumph.

The dancing is flawless and emotional, supported by the Boston Ballet Orchestra's (featuring Guest Conductor David Briskin) performance of the powerful Tchaikovsky score built by K. H. Stolze out of a variety of previously unconnected Tchaikovsky pieces.

The Boston Ballet has a unique relationship to this work. It presented Onegin's USA premiere in 1994, and revisited it in 1997 and 2002. For this year's production the elegant sets and the costume designs - the work of long-time Cranko collaborators - are on loan from the Dutch National Ballet and the staging is overseen by Reid Anderson, Stuttgart Ballet's Artistic Director. Dance lovers can only hope that the Boston Ballet will make "Onegin" a more frequent part of their repertoire.