“Elláda” (“Minotaur”/“Leda and the Swans”)
MuzArts
Maly Theatre
Moscow, Russia
June 15 and 22, 2026 (video)
by Ilona Landgraf
Copyright © 2026 by Ilona Landgraf
In mid-June, Moscow’s production company MuzArts premiered the double bill Elláda at the Maly Theatre. Moscow’s local press called MuzArts’ director, Yuri Baranov, “Russia’s current top ballet producer with an excellent grasp on the global ballet scene who knows how to create ideas, discover and recruit talent, and attract sponsors,”—in short, a Diaghilev 2.0. So I was glad that MuzArts’ executive producer, Daria Faezova, sent video recordings of both performances. If a company is in the vanguard of a dance scene as vibrant as Russia’s, you won’t want to miss their productions.
Elláda (the native name of Greece in Modern Greek) combines two choreographies by Patrick De Bana, both dealing with Greek mythology: Minotaur, created for MuzArts’ 2022 Labyrinth project, and Leda and the Swans, a newly created pre-anniversary gift for the late Maurice Béjart, who would have celebrated his hundredth birthday next year and in whose company, Béjart Ballet Lausanne, De Bana was a principal dancer. Leda and the Swans pays tribute to Béjart’s 1975 Leda and the Swan (created for Maya Plisetskaya and Jorge Donn) and integrates an unrealized piece about Leda’s sons, Castor and Pollux, commissioned by the late Vladimir Shklyarov. Shklyarov and Kimin Kim intended to star for a private evening at the Mariinsky Theatre but didn’t due to Shklyarov’s premature death.
Except for Ildar Gainutdinov, a multi-awarded principal soloist of Alla Dukhova’s Russian dance theater, Todes, all of Elláda’s dancers are from the Bolshoi Ballet’s roster.
The protagonists of Minotaur are the half-man, half-bull Minotaur (born from his mother, Pasiphaë, and a bull), Pasiphaë, and her daughter Ariadne. A corps of four men (Vasily Danilchuk, Anton Savichev, Karim Abdullin, and Daniil Babkin) portrayed the Minotaur’s alter ego.
Greek mythology depicts Ariadne as the guardian of the labyrinth in which the Minotaur was caged but not her feelings for the beast. In De Bana’s interpretation, she and her mother lust after it, Ariadne in a painfully intense way and Pasiphaë with tender fondness. Instead of a labyrinth, a circle of light on an otherwise gloomy stage confined the Minotaur as if in a bull ring. Although it opened to stage width at times, it allowed neither the Minotaur nor Ariadne to escape. Only Pasiphaë could enter and leave at will. She and her daughter never shared a glance or bridged the distance separating them.
An abstract bull’s head in the rear center stage made of ancient, knotty wood symbolized the Minotaur’s beastliness but, with its perfectly shaped horns, also his beauty and might (set design by Dashi Namdakov). Undamaged by time and, thanks to Ivan Vinogradov’s lighting, shining silver or golden, these horns looked like an eternal manifestation of the Minotaur’s fate. At times, a light beamed from the slit between the head’s two sides. Other times, Ariadne retreated inside the head, her hand caressing its surface through the slit.
In contrast to the mythology, De Bana’s Minotaur (Ildar Gainutdinov) was no ferocious, man-devouring monster, but a creature torn by his two natures. His human half yearned for a love he knew he would never attain. Wearing an ornamental top studded with silver metal and black leather pants (costumes by Igor Chapurin), he stood with his back toward the audience, his torso crouched, and his shoulders hunched like Quasimodo’s. It was silent when he slowly turned, faced the audience, suddenly stretched into a diagonal, and bent into a deep curl. The clarity of his supple, strong movements astounded. Like a galloping bull, his arms plowed through the air. Then he curled again, turned, and stopped partway like a locked flywheel. Holding his belly with one hand as if to calm an inner pain, his other arm stretched sideways and, opening his fist, allowed him to exhale. Only then did Max Richter’s searing music set in.
Ariadne (Maria Bogdanovich) stood motionless all the while at the other side of the stage. She wore a bright red, high-slit dress with a light-brown bust, as if she were a toreador’s red rag. The music unfroze her but didn’t mellow her terrified glance. The Minotaur attracted and repelled her. In his presence, her womb tightened up with desire but when she dared to glance at him, her legs stiffened to wood, teetering with horror. She seemed caught in an infinite loop—one of her arms reached out for the Minotaur while the other pulled it back, her elbow bent into a defensive rectangle.
Only stretching one arm upward gave her a brief pause to breathe. Often, the Minotaur succumbed to the tension, collapsed, and lay emasculated or contorted, hardly able to suppress his convulsions. He approached Ariadne carefully on all fours and slowly stood up, and, with eyes glued on her, exposed his body. She didn’t move an inch as he ran toward her like a bull, his head aimed at her womb. Most of their encounters resembled a hell-bent fight, but none consummated their desire. They couldn’t and mustn’t come together.
Pasiphaë’s (Darina Moseyeva’s) relationship to the Minotaur wavered between motherly care (which was balm for his soul) and romantic attachment (which always caused him to push her away). Her transparent black dress and the darkness that almost absorbed her body made her and her emotions remnants of the past. She finally sat isolated at the right front stage, looking away from the Minotaur, who collapsed at Ariadne’s feet. Both looked exhausted from fighting an inevitable fate.
The second performance’s Minotaur, Daniil Potaptsev, lost many details of the choreography and couldn’t match Gainutdinov’s extraordinary stage presence. Anastasia Stashkevich lacked the power and bite to convey Ariadne’s struggle. Olga Marchenkova’s Pasiphaë convinced.
Leda and the Swans complemented Minotaur like flip sides of a coin. In both pieces, the protagonists were tools of a transcendental rule book in which individual fate doesn’t count. Instead of a male hero coveted by two women, one woman—the Spartan queen Leda (Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova)—was desired by two men, Zeus in a swan’s guise (Mark Orlov) and Pollux (Nikita Kapustin), one of her twin sons. Literature doesn’t corroborate this mother-son romance or name Hades as part of the party. But librettist José Andrade decided otherwise and, like in Minotaur with King Minos, omitted minor characters such as the heroine’s husband, Sparta’s King Tyndareus.
Like in Minotaur, blackouts separated the scenes of Leda and the Swans. Set elements were inversely positioned. Instead of a bull’s head center stage, two thrones (a turquoise-golden one for Zeus and a silver one for Hades) stood in each rear corner (set design by Tatiana Vyushinskaya).
Leda and the Swans is less dense than Minotaur and has repetitive choreography. That couldn’t be remedied, but the second performance had more flow. It also had a more effective lighting. White circles of light swiveled across the floor for a much shorter time, and a gentle light wavered across transparent plastic stripes hanging from the ceiling that provided a subtle momentum similar to the sun reflecting on water’s surface.
De Bana, moreover, replaced the static blue and gray backdrop with a loosely folded, gold curtain. He dropped the scene in which Hades sneaked onto Zeus’s throne and clarified Leda’s and Pollux’s relationship. She looked for Pollux’s help when gripped by the furious Zeus, whereupon Pollux, grasping his father’s hand, implored him to let her free. Another scene, during which Leda sat at the front stage, became an explicit quotation when she, like Ariadne in Minotaur, undid her hair. The final scene was also reworked. Leda wasn’t sitting at Zeus’s feet anymore, but rather, he sat at hers.
Last but not least, the bizarre character of Hades, initially fleshed out by Daniil Potaptsev, evolved into a mesmerizing figure as danced by Ildar Gainutdinov. He writhed spastically on his throne, watching from under a hood, as merciless strings urged Zeus to seduce Leda (music by Ezio Bosso).
Only when they became intimate did he jump off and throw off his black cape under which he wore a floor-length skirt made of black stripes, a black shoulder strap on an otherwise bare chest, and black wristbands (costumes by Stephanie Bäuerle). He ran in circles as if to mark his arena and, time after time, frantically grabbed threads of a fate that he failed to tie together (and would continue to fail throughout the piece).
Sometimes, Hades obscenely licked his index finger, which worked like a miraculous weapon. He used it cold-bloodedly but also explored it like a wondering child. Pointed toward the lovers, it prompted Zeus to his feet, and pointed toward Zeus’s heart, it pierced his conscience. (Though the king of the gods rebuffed Hades’s reproach, he looked the weaker part.) Nudging Castor (Anton Savichev) as nonchalantly as if dabbing a touchscreen just for fun, the finger sent him to his death. It also revived him like a human guinea pig upon which Hades continued to experiment and explore his capabilities (after overcoming his repulsion by Castor’s smell).
But that happened only later. For quite some time, the idyllic family carried on tranquilly, though six female shadows signaled the netherworld’s presence in the rear. Zeus slouched on his throne like a TV addict wishing not to be disturbed, and the twins danced identically or in mirror-image like figures on old Greek vases. Indistinguishable at first sight, nothing betrayed that Castor was Tyndareus’s son and mortal, whereas Pollux was Zeus’s son and hence divine. Upon detecting Pollux’s desire for his mother, Zeus expelled him. (That this wasn’t the reason for Pollux’s subsequent death wasn’t apparent.) Magnetically attracted to Leda, Zeus’s wings spread protectively above her, but his grip also enforced her submission.
Leda reminded me of a fragile bird whose behavioral repertory was predetermined by nature. The embodiment of men’s desire, she lay on the floor in a delicate tunic, every fiber eager to be touched. Even when she tried to ward off Zeus, her entire physiology conveyed softness and devotion. Her twins had already entered the afterworld, where they knelt side by side, their fingers pointing toward the starry sky as if searching for their constellation. Towering above Zeus’s head like an icon, she remained an eternal beauty. Hades had won nothing but seemed even more tortured by spasms.
| Link: | Website of the Maly Theatre | |
| Photos: | 1. | Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur) and ensemble, “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov |
| 2. | Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur) and Anastasia Stashkevich (Ariadne), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 3. | Anastasia Stashkevich (Ariadne) and Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 4. | Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur) and Anastasia Stashkevich (Ariadne), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 5. | Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur), Olga Marchenkova (Pasiphaë), and Anastasia Stashkevich (Ariadne); “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 6. | Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur) and Olga Marchenkova (Pasiphaë), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 7. | Olga Marchenkova (Pasiphaë) and Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 8. | Olga Marchenkova (Pasiphaë), Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur), and Anastasia Stashkevich (Ariadne); “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 9. | Anastasia Stashkevich (Ariadne) and ensemble, “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 10. | Daniil Potaptsev (Minotaur) and Anastasia Stashkevich (Ariadne), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 11. | Ildar Gainutdinov (Minotaur), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 12. | Maria Bogdanovich (Ariadne), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 13. | Maria Bogdanovich (Ariadne), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 14. | Maria Bogdanovich (Ariadne), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 15. | Maria Bogdanovich (Ariadne) and Ildar Gainutdinov (Minotaur), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 16. | Maria Bogdanovich (Ariadne) and Ildar Gainutdinov (Minotaur), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev |
|
| 17. | Maria Bogdanovich (Ariadne) and Ildar Gainutdinov (Minotaur), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 18. | Ildar Gainutdinov (Minotaur) and Darina Moseyeva (Pasiphaë), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 19. | Ildar Gainutdinov (Minotaur) and Darina Moseyeva (Pasiphaë), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 20. | Maria Bogdanovich (Ariadne) and Ildar Gainutdinov (Minotaur), “Minotaur” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov |
|
| 21. | Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda) and Mark Orlov (Zeus), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 22. | Mark Orlov (Zeus) and Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 23. | Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda) and Mark Orlov (Zeus), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 24. | Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda), Mark Orlov (Zeus), and Daniil Potaptsev (Hades); “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 25. | Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda), Mark Orlov (Zeus), and Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades); “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 26. | Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 27. | Mark Orlov (Zeus), and Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 28. | Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades) and ensemble, “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 29. | Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 30. | Nikita Kapustin (Pollux) and Anton Savichev (Castor), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 31. | Daniil Potaptsev (Hades) and Anton Savichev (Castor), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Andrei Stepanov | |
| 32. | Anton Savichev (Castor) and Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 33. | Anton Savichev (Castor) and Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 34. | Anton Savichev (Castor), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 35. | Anton Savichev (Castor) and Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades), “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 36. | Mark Orlov (Zeus), Nikita Kapustin (Pollux), and Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda); “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 37. | Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda), Nikita Kapustin (Pollux), and Mark Orlov (Zeus); “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| 38. | Polina Netsvetaeva-Dolgalyova (Leda), Mark Orlov (Zeus), Nikita Kapustin (Pollux), Anton Savichev (Castor), and Ildar Gainutdinov (Hades); “Leda and the Swans” by Patrick De Bana, MuzArts 2026 © MuzArts/Batyr Annadurdiev | |
| Editing: | Kayla Kauffman |