‘It makes you feel alive’: Royal Ballet’s Marianela Nunez and Vadim Muntagirov on dancing La Bayadère in Hong Kong
- Marianela Nunez and Vadim Muntagirov, principal dancers with the UK’s Royal Ballet, relish being in Hong Kong as guest dancers with the Hong Kong Ballet
- For their part, the Hong Kong troupe’s dancers, who will join them on stage for two performances, are thrilled to watch the stars in action
As Marianela Nuñez finishes her Act Three solo in La Bayadère, wild applause rings out – and it gets even wilder after her partner, Vadim Muntagirov, completes his own solo.
We are in the rehearsal studio at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre and the audience consists of dancers from the Hong Kong Ballet, thrilled to be up close and personal with dancing of this stratospheric level.
Nuñez and Muntagirov are both superstars, but you’d never guess it from how they behave.
The two principals from the Royal Ballet, in the city as guest dancers with Hong Kong Ballet, accept the company’s applause with laughter and mock bows; throughout the day, they sit on the studio floor to watch the local dancers rehearse, applauding them too, chatting or cheerfully taking shyly requested photos with them.
Sitting down to talk to the Post later, the pair are refreshingly down to earth.
Nuñez, 41, recently celebrated her 25th year with the Royal Ballet. Born in Argentina but a long-time UK resident, she had spent just one year with the Royal Ballet School.
She rose rapidly through the ranks to become principal dancer in 2002, and is widely regarded as one of the best ballerinas of her generation.
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Russia-born Muntagirov, 33, has also lived in the UK since his teens. Like Nuñez, his talent was spotted early, and he has been dancing lead roles since he was 20. In 2014, he had just moved from the English National Ballet to the Royal Ballet when he was cast in The Sleeping Beauty as Prince Florimund.
Nuñez’s then regular dance partner was injured and Muntagirov was asked to step in. “After that, we started to be cast together in pretty much everything,” says Nuñez.
Their rapport is manifest – Nuñez is the extrovert, Muntagirov the quiet one – and they balance each other beautifully, offstage and on.
They have only danced La Bayadère together once in London, which is why they were happy to accept the invitation to do it in Hong Kong.
Nuñez says it is a ballet she absolutely loves. “I hear the music and it hits me like, deep here, it makes you want to dance. It makes you feel alive.”
Created by Marius Petipa in St Petersburg in 1877, the ballet is set in a fantasy India and tells the story of Nikiya, a temple dancer (Bayadère), her lover, the warrior Solor, and Gamzatti, the Rajah’s daughter whom the Rajah orders Solor to marry.
Forced to dance at the betrothal celebration, Nikiya dies when bitten by a snake that Gamzatti has had concealed in a basket of flowers.
Nuñez loves the story with its “complex characters” and, having danced both Nikiya and Gamzatti, she feels Gamzatti is not a villain, just someone trapped in a bad situation.
Unlike the hero in Swan Lake or Giselle, who shows remorse for betraying the heroine, Solor seems happy to marry Gamzatti.
“I’m trying to make it softer, be a little nicer,” says Muntagirov, who adds that he relishes the challenge of dancing one of the most demanding roles in the repertoire.
“As Solor I’m a warrior, so all the movements have to be much bigger, heavier, more mature, more manly. That’s one of the reasons I like it.”
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Another reason for coming to Hong Kong was the opportunity to work with Vladimir Malakhov, who is staging his production of the ballet in the city.
A former artistic director of the Berlin State Ballet, Malakhov was himself a superstar dancer and repeatedly won awards for “best dancer in the world”.
Nuñez calls him “a legend in the ballet world”.
“It’s been amazing to work with him, we can breathe his knowledge.”
Malakhov is able to work on tiny details “which make a massive difference” and he has “a fabulous sense of humour” which helps them relax, she adds.
While they thrive on pressure, the two stars say they both still suffer from nerves. For Nuñez, that’s not only because of her expectations of herself but because experience means you know that some shows will be great, some “not so great”.
Muntagirov says Nuñez is a perfectionist who repeats steps “hundreds, thousands of times”. Still, you cannot prepare for everything, including wardrobe malfunctions.
Muntagirov recalls the time he “got stuck underneath Marianela’s tutu” halfway through the pas de deux in The Nutcracker several years ago.
Nuñez bursts out laughing. “His head was literally under my butt! No kidding!” She leaps up to demonstrate, followed by Muntagirov. “The longest minute of my life!” says Muntagirov.
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The two dancers are enjoying having two weeks to work with Hong Kong Ballet.
Often, as guest dancers abroad, “you feel like we arrive, show off how we perform and go back”, says Muntagirov. “And this time, because we have two weeks, it feels like we learn so much every day.”
The pair are impressed by the Hong Kong Ballet’s dancers, who are “very friendly, very helpful” and also very disciplined. Nuñez notes that, after having done a full run of the ballet in the morning, the dancers did another full run for herself and Muntagirov in the afternoon, without complaint.
As for the dancers themselves, complaining is the last thing on their minds.
Soloist Wang Qingxin, who will be dancing Gamzatti, tells me she has been moved to tears watching Nuñez.
Seeing such a great artist “shows you everything that ballet can be”, she says.
“La Bayadère”, Hong Kong Ballet with live accompaniment by the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, Grand Theatre, Hong Kong Cultural Centre, June 2, 7.30pm, June 3-4, 2.30pm and 7.30pm. Nuñez and Muntagirov appear on June 2, 7.30pm and June 4, 2.30pm.
