With 30 years’ experience on stage at the Mariinsky Theatre, from the corps de ballet to solo parts, Nikolai Naumov now primarily performs acting roles. He spoke with VaganovaToday about his career and about acting technique on stage in the great theatre. The Russian version of this interview can be found here.
You were born in the city of Pushkin. How did you start dancing?
Prior to me, my family had no relationship to the theatre, much less to ballet. But two family members participated in the world of music, my aunt Vera, who is an amazing piano teacher, and her daughter who is my cousin Nadia, an incredibly talented pianist and simply an ace in her profession!
It just so happened that among those in my family, only I ended up with connection to the Mariinsky, as a dancer, and moreover in ballet. In short, a ballet dancer with a diploma is at your service.
And I began, as often happens, accidentally. At least, I was so inclined to think for a long time. Although with experience from all the years I’ve lived, I’ve found some degree of logic in my path.
In the city of Pushkin, where my family settled in the late 1960s, there was an audition held for children at the House of Officers for a new children’s choreographic dancing group. Two very young people held the auditions, a young man and woman who had just graduated from the KultProSvet School at 57 Dzerzhinsky street in Leningrad (now Gorokhovaya Ulitsa), their names were Viktor Ivanovich and Veronika Vladimirovna. My aunt Vera took her daughter Nadya to the audition and brought me along for company, for convenience. Naturally they accepted us both immediately. Everything in the lesson was done in a genuine manner: we did a barre, center, jumps, and they stretched us. We learned the movements and their French names. They set dances on us which we rehearsed. We performed in end-of-the-year concerts, and other concerts. Nadya, however, did not continue to take lessons, but shouldn’t be admonished for it as she’s now a super professional pianist and at that time had already studied the piano for more than a year. She made the correct choice, while I remained and continued to sweat in the circle of like-minded tiny tots. It was there that I first heard about potential growth in this area — a thought that had never entered my head previously. I learned from my young teachers that Leningrad had a dance school that, if you torture yourself for long enough, you can attend and they’d definitively teach you how to dance there. That was of course interesting, but not for me.
At the age of 9, I ended up at 2 Rossi Street at the doorstep of the Leningrad Academic Choreographic Institute named after A. Y. Vaganova [now known commonly as the “Vaganova Academy”] and participated in the entrance exams. I wasn’t accepted. They said something to me and sent me home. I left the depressing walls with a greater sense of ease. I never would have taken that step in that direction on my own, but I never said a word about it to my mother.
My mother and her sister Vera played the piano in their childhoods, it was a piano that their thoughtful parents—who were far from the world of music– had purchased for the children. My mother wasn’t meant to be in the world of music. But her interest in it, which grew to a sincere love for singing in particular, and more specifically for opera, had already begun to form in her younger years. In the middle of the 1960s, my 20th century mother was a student of the Philology Department at Zhdanov Leningrad State University. Of course inside this whole whirlwind, she quenched her thirst for opera by attending performances at the Kirov Theatre. And so that this would be even easier to do, she even found work in the Women’s Costume Department. So to some degree, I wasn’t the first person in our family on this “moon”, the Mariinsky Theatre. With a smile, I might almost say we have a very short dynasty. But all jokes aside, with my mother’s help, prior to dancing, and then for some time in parallel, I sang in the Youth Club choir in the city of Pushkin. I even performed in the Capello in the composite Boy’s Choir. But unlike choreography, nobody was impressed by my prospects in choir. So I didn’t become a singer. Instead I attended the Vaganova Academy after my second audition there, and completely left singing. Between my first and second auditions at the Academy one year had passed, during which time my mother had found me a pedagogue for additional classes. Her name was Nadezhda Viktorovna Fyodorova, who just before then had taught at the famous Academy herself and furthermore, she was a direct student of Agrippina Vaganova. They took me to her home on Gagarin Prospekt and she, in a heartful, domestic manner, quietly worked with me using counting aloud as a guide. I held on to a small pole attached to the top of a chair that was especially adapted for the purpose of these lessons as a “barre”. And after that second audition, I began to attend the Vaganova Academy in class ¼ А under Maria Vladimirovna Boyarchikova, who was a senior pedagogue at the Academy. At that time, she was 82 years old.
Photo above right: Agrippina Vaganova with Nadezhda Fyodorova
What were your impressions of the Academy?
First of all, it was a dramatic change of location. After attending a typical Soviet school, I suddenly found myself in a building of unprecedented beauty with huge studios and long hallways. You know the expression “a soul shaping landscape”, well this new place began to shape (or reshape) my soul. In addition, my free time was much more limited. I left home early in the morning. And if previously my whole life was spent in Pushkin: I ran to school, raced home, ate lunch, then attended one children’s class and then another, and in between rode my bike with friends, with Saturday and Sunday as days off, suddenly I was absent for the entire day. Our lessons began at 9:20 a.m. and ended at 5:30 p.m. and if we had practicuum, concerts or rehearsals, those were always after our lessons, starting at 6:00 p.m. or 7:00 p.m. There was no free time left, but it was fun.
It seemed to me that nobody liked our ballet classes, especially during the first year. That lesson began at 11 a.m. It was boring and slow, you stand there and stretch. That’s brutal for a child. Then pliés, deep knee bends, very slow and seemingly endless. But that trains your muscles. By the older classes my relationship to lessons changed, because the static poses disappeared, more movement appeared in the combinations, the tempi increased, and as odd as it sounds, classes became a lot easier although the workload was greater. It was always more enjoyable to move while we jumped and not stay in one place.
But at the early stage of our studies, I was bored sick, although I didn’t show it.
Every year, there were fewer and fewer students. Some were dismissed after the exams. Some left of their own accord because they just could not keep pace.
In our fifth year (there were 8 years in all), they wanted to dismiss me as well. Who intervened isn’t clear. I simply could not handle the physical workload. My growing body was completely worn out. Later I learned just how dangerous this moment was. But everything turned out the way that it did. It’s strange to think how my life would have turned out if I had left the Academy then. I’m glad that I managed to stay. (Photo at left: Naumov in the children’s number “Chepayevtsi”)
And since they allowed me to stay, we had to use that opportunity to change things, to demonstrate to the ill-wishers my right to continue training. But the person doing the changing wasn’t me but my mother. I can’t imagine what it cost her. Remember, in the 1990s, the country had flown into an abyss, pulling with it, just like the “Titanik”, a huge number of people. Salaries went unpaid, there was some food brought in, most likely meat, but only in the lunchrooms of government institutions. Stray animals disappeared from the streets. The pigeon population grew sparse. There was hunger, dirt, and darkness. My mother protected me from all of this as much as she could. But I didn’t understand immediately what sort of steps my mother undertook for me every day. Children often see their parents’ sacrifice as an obligation.
At first it was decided we would conserve my strength and the time spent commuting, which was three hours a day. And the economy turned out to be 100%. My mother rented a room in St. Petersburg. We lived at 2 Rossi Street, apartment 57. The room was 28 square meters but with a low ceiling. It was part of a communal apartment on the top (6th) floor. The room had just been vacated by its previous tenant, the well-known ballet dancer Igor Anatolievich Zelensky. Marginal neighbors recalled him with respect, it seemed to me.
Across from our apartment there was the separate apartment of Nikolai Vasilievich Zavyalov, a former dancer who at the time was the head of the Pantomime Department in the Kirov Theatre. In the past, he’d been friends with Leonid Jakobson. Once, on a clear spring morning (during the first year of my work in the theatre), having recognized me in the courtyard as not just a neighbor but a colleague, Nikolai Vasilievich called out to me and asked if I was going to the theatre, and asked, if I would be so kind, to wait a little bit while he finished preparing the garage, so he could take me in his car to the theatre. And I unexpectedly suddenly had the boldness to not refuse. In the courtyard on Rossi Street there was an old heated garage with a wooden gate, and he nourished and cherished his dazzling, chrome-plated, shining “VOLGA” in it. We went off to our jobs in the theatre in that car. We travelled slowly on Nevsky Prospekt in the middle. I sat next to him in the front on the light-colored leather seats and watched the oncoming and passing cars. At one point he distracted me with stories about Leonid Jakobson and other topics.
We had a piano lesson at the Academy. My mother rented a piano of the same size for us at home, a small but a genuine F. MUHLBACH piano (they still exist today). Along with my classmates, we clinked away mercilessly. You could hardly call it music, but musical chit chat. From the staircase you could go into the attic (we had the key to it from our apartment) and from there, unimpeded, directly onto the roof. I remember how I prepared for our academic subject exams up there in the springtime. At that time it was possible to walk around the entire neighborhood by the rooftops, which my classmates and I did more than once. Everything was possible then. Donuts… If you had 20 kopecks they were yours. We would run to the donut shop on the other side of the Fontanka river. Those donuts were sold by weight, not by piece, and they came in various shapes and sizes, large and small, crooked and smooth. Sometimes they gave you four and sometimes eight, but the weight would be the same. I loved when they gave you eight, hot and sprinkled with powdered sugar. And the coffee was delicious from the pitcher. My childhood memories bring me only joy. Sometimes I now miss those days.
We lived on Rossi Street for 4 years. Now that apartment and that room no longer exist. The Academy swallowed them up. But you can still look out of those windows onto recognizable, clean rooftops. (The second and third windows from the entrance onto the balcony of the new large studio).
Who were your pedagogues?
Maria Vladimirovna Boyarchikova, born in 1903. (in photo at left; Naumov is behind her at far left) Her son, Nikolai Boyarchikov, held the position of Artistic Director and Balletmaster at the Maly (now Mikhailovsky) Theatre at that time. Maria Vladimirovna taught us class for the first two years. There were concerts held in the school’s theatre annually, and the smallest children had to participate in them. I remember the number “Chepayevtsi”. We rehearsed it after our lessons and Maria Vladimirovna read us books, while we ate bread rolls and drank milk – she bought all of it for us out of the kindness of her heart. She was like a nanny to us, and it was very unusual – homey and welcoming. I’m very grateful to her for her sincerity, her touching, soul-stirring relationship toward us and her endless patience.
Pyotr Afanasievich Silkin (photo below) replaced Maria Vladimirovna during our third year. He worked on our stretching as no one had done before him or after him. He used a method of floor exercises. After we came back from vacation, we immediately laid down on the floor. It began with “circling our toes, feet, legs”. The growing workload while stretching gave us an understanding of our bodies. He prepared us in this manner. Not every teacher did that. Typical ballet classes take place standing up. We enjoyed these exercises because the barre is boring but here we had some variety.
He used all kinds of tiny methods of torture on us, after which bruises appeared in various places … he could pinch or scratch us with his nail. The logic was clear, this is how he let us know which muscle he wanted us to use, because words are words but don’t always work.
Looking at our labors from the side, Pyotr Afanasievich said, “…and more intellectual faces”. He filmed us taking class at one point. The photographs remain: in some of them we’re lifting legs, in others jumping. When you look at the expressions on our faces during the jumps, laughter arises amidst tears, it’s so horrible. I couldn’t imagine that we, a group of normal guys, not even the ugliest group, could have such faces! But when we jumped we contracted and our physiognomy became less “intellectual”. It’s all on film.
But we graduated from Vitaly Ivanovich Afanaskov. He had just completed his stage career at the Kirov Theatre and was a young pedagogue.
I’ve mentioned only the pedagogues according to specialized areas, but there were also Valentina Dmitrievna Chistova and Nataliya Stanislavovna Yananis for historical folk dance, Voldemar Kuzmich Korneev for character dance, Nikolai Nikolayevich Serebrennikov for duet dance (see photo below with students), and Tatiana Ivanovna Shmyrova and Margarita Nikolayevna Alfimova for acting classes.
Did you know that you would be accepted into the Mariinsky Theatre?
No, I didn’t know. Looking back at myself now, I can firmly say that I didn’t understand anything that was happening to me. I was a hard-working and patient student, but in the later classes it became clear that I couldn’t perform god-like turns or jump like Nijinsky. I didn’t have any breathtaking capabilities. After the state exams, there was an open class held with representatives from the Mariinsky and from other theatres. And the first offer of employment arrived to me from Boris Eifman’s company. We had a pedagogue, A.V. Lysitsin, who taught history of the theatre 
and was an Eifman propagandist, he thought that the Mariinsky Theatre was a swamp and Eifman’s company was promising, progressive, dynamically developing and open to everything and so forth. As I understood, everyone received an offer from Eifman. Two boys from our class joined his company. Then one of them, answering a question about the salary there, said, “What? How much do they pay? No. Very little.” And then a positive comment, “But there is a LOT of work!” He didn’t last long there. But another one of my classmates worked there his entire life until he retired. I also received an offer from the Maly Theatre and several days later from the Mariinsky, I think because at that time the head balletmaster and artistic director of the ballet troupe at the Mariinsky, Oleg Mikhailovich Vinogradov, decided to update the company which at the time had a lot of older dancers. We were slender and young. In order to dance waltzes and mass ensemble numbers, you don’t need to have exceptional capabilities. So the humble assessment about my specialization did not have any decisive significance at that time.
My choice naturally fell upon the Mariinsky because … because I didn’t choose the other theatres. By nature I’m “retrograde” — everything that’s extremely new and progressive disconcerts me. So I chose what was larger and calmer.
Who did you work with inside the theatre?
I had wonderful pedagogues. Iraida Nikolaevna Utretzskaya (shown below, right) was my first pedagogue in the theatre. During my first year of employment, after working with her, I performed the “Fandango” in “Don Quixote”, the Spanish and Hungarian dances in “Swan Lake”, and “Lezginka” in the opera “Ruslan and Ludmila”, she said to me “What else would you like to dance? Think about it and go ask the administration, we will rehearse those roles.” I have to say that for me, asking someone for something for myself was always impossible. Embarrassed, and finding my words with great difficulty, I somehow explained this to her. I said that I couldn’t ask for roles but would be glad to perform anything at all. To my surprise and joy, Iraida replied, “I understand, I also couldn’t ever ask anything of anyone.”
She shouted loudly during our rehearsals. This led me to believe that I was full rubbish, but after yet another “loud” rehearsal, she quietly explained, “Don’t pay any attention to my shouting. I just see that you can do better.” I’m grateful she told me this, otherwise I would have completely shut down. For me it was important to understand that this shouting wasn’t an expression of negative emotions.
Dmitry Voldemarovich Korneev was my pedagogue for acting roles. Our primary joint work was on Tybalt in “Romeo and Juliet” and on Girei in “The Fountain of Bakchisarei”. Later we worked together on Abdurakhman from “Raymonda”, the Great Brahmin from “Bayadere” and then dances from various operas. I crafted my role as Mayakovsky, the poet, from the ballet “Bedbugs” choreographed by Leonid Jakobson from him as well (photo below left).
Igor Yurievich Petrov gave me the role of Vizir from “The Legend of Love”, the most physically demanding role. None of the other pedagogues ever filled me with such faith in myself as Petrov did. Working with him, even for a short period, I felt that I could do anything. His help is difficult to overestimate.
Gennady Babanin is a great actor, an unforgettable Severyan (from “The Stone Flower”) and although he was not a rehearsal coach in the theatre, he placed his hand on my Hilarion from “Giselle”, a role which Redzhepmirat Abdiev helped me to further polish to perfection. And I give full credit to Babanin for my role as Gurn in “La Sylphide”.
How has the theatre changed in the last 30 years?
For the last 30 years, the theatre has grown a great deal. I mean, the scale of the institution today.
The troupe has grown, respectively. The repertoire is significantly larger. It’s probably more interesting to work now. Why “probably”? Because modern productions are not my purview, and there are more than just a handful of them now. I’m involved mainly in the classical repertoire. I think it’s more interesting for the younger generation to work in the theatre now, but a lot more difficult for them as well. The troupe today is very young, and that’s a good thing. But that carries with it some drawbacks. When we joined the theatre, we entered the repertoire gradually, performing in new productions piecemeal, and ending up on stage alongside mature artists who helped us to not get lost, who explained to us what was what, but didn’t force anything. If you didn’t understand from the first try, then that was your problem.
The organization of the process in that way led us to use our brains rather quickly, and not just get slapped around by the older artists. And it wasn’t possible to harm a production, even with an unsuccessful debut.
Now it isn’t infrequently that an inexperienced cast is performing in a production sprinkled with just a few old-timers. There is little time for rehearsals. They don’t care about the nuances. The way they saw it is the way they do it. As a result, 10 different variations arise and there’s no end in sight. To teach ten people at once is harder to do than to teach just one person. They need to at least learn the order of the choreography in some way. And no one discusses the meaning, as a rule. And not knowing the meaning of the movements gives birth to stupidity and unnaturalness on stage (that is, it seems out of context). So you then end up looking at bodies that do not move naturally with eyes that are focused on the floor. And no one specifically is to blame for this. There is no time for all these trifles, like the meaning of what is taking place. The dancers most likely have no time to prepare themselves for the roles. And the rehearsal coaches have no time to explain. The dancers need to at least learn the surface order of the choreography in the productions. After all, we’re artists and we need to justify our existence on stage and bestow meaning onto our characters
In order to do this, you have to first know who you are, why, and what for? You have to be interested in the subject matter. The eyes are the windows to the soul, they say. But if the soul is asleep or just doesn’t need this, then what are those dancers going to express? We’ve forgotten what we were taught about how to live through choreographic pauses (the places in productions where there is music, but no set choreography). And it turns out that all you need is a little bit of fantasy to fill those spots using that same acting technique. Or do people think this concerns only soloists and character roles? So for example, the corps de ballet is walking around in army-like formations on stage, and everyone raises their arm on the musical accent, which is apparently supposed to depict joy or participation. Except for some reason it looks silly when everyone is acting like one and the same person. But we’re used to it. We don’t think about it, and that’s fine with us. It’s only the viewer who is asking the not–so-silly question: why do the dancers move so unnaturally on stage? You could convince me easily that it was always that way and the corps de ballet can’t figure out acting tasks for themselves, and that I’m simply idealizing the past (as some sort of youthful maximalism) if there were not videotapes of the 1990’s in which I too participated and which you can watch today, and it’s compared to these that I sense this dissonance. Everything is clear on those films. No, my memory does not deceive me. Dancers thought up how to fill out the mis-en-scènes. At times they improvised successfully and enjoyed doing it. The square in Seville is a square and not soldier’s barracks. A marketplace is a market and not a set of crocodiles and circle dances. Pirates are pirates. The crowd of people are a medley — happy, and varied. And it’s not necessary to breed an effervescence of acting technique in every single person on stage. In order to animate a given scene in a way that is believable, it’s enough to have just a few enthusiasts who simply love what they do. The rest can move harmoniously and be present within the context of the production with lively and intellectual faces. Each person is different. Of course I’m not speaking about the deep classics here. But why has it changed? I’m shifting into some sort of yearning now, but I hope that answers your question.
(Photo above far right: Naumov as the Poet Mayakovsky in “The Bedbug”, one of his signature roles; above left: Naumov as the Pharaoh.)
Do you have any idols?
No. I didn’t have idols in the past and I don’t have any now. But there were people, events, performances that left their impressions in my memory and ingrained their footprints on my soul. Pisarev’s “Walpurgis Nacht”. The involuntary sigh and subsequent screeching, shouting and stamping of the thousand-person house at “Luna Park” in Buenos Aires, which was unprepared for Igor Zelensky’s jumps. The meeting with Nureyev in the hallway of the Academy and his farewell “Sylphide”. Makarova’s smile. Roman Viktiuk’s performance with her participation at the Alexandrinsky Theatre. Viktiuk himself, by the way, invited us to that performance. And I don’t recall how, but after that we watched his “Servant” with the first cast. You understand what sort of effect that had on us as school children. Of course Baryshnikov. I never saw him on stage but do you really need to see God to believe in him? He’s an icon! And so in the lobby of the Osake Hotel, standing across from each other, two men are speaking with each other and one of them is HIM. I just sat there and watched, afraid to blink. Also Acosta in “Acteon”. The unwieldly Le Riche in “Prodigal Son”. Plisetskaya’s Jubilee performance at the Mariinsky, in profile from the last wing of the stage on the women’s side. She’s in a white tutu and pointe shoes. In the gleam of the spotlight the famous Plisetskaya arms. And it didn’t make any difference that they were covered in skin-colored lycra.
The Alvin Ailey troupe. Lunch with the first ever Tybalt, R. I. Gerbek at his house on Nevsky Prospekt. Then I couldn’t even imagine speaking with him about my future role of Tybalt. The short conversation with Elena Obratsova in the airplane vestibule. Igor Belsky, tossing his cane away and dancing the Spanish dance from “Nutcracker” in front of me. Such moments lit a fire inside me that will last forever.
In the West, for the most part, classes in “Acting Technique” do not exist in the same format as they do in Russia. As I understand, this subject serves as a basis for dramatic acting roles and the expression of various characters on stage. Who taught you this subject and what were the lessons like?
Tatiana Ivanovna Shmyrova (photo at left). But a year prior to our graduation she broke her leg during a lesson and we graduated under Margarita Nikolaevna Alfimova.
You know, I don’t want to say that my school classes in acting technique did not leave any bright memories. I remember the number “Blind” in which we needed to walk near a girl from our class, as I recall, not even touching her, and make it appear as if we were protecting her from falling, from taking dangerous steps, because she was depicting a blind girl wandering uncertainly and we were supposed to love her. I thought that the girls in this number had an easier task that was also more interesting. I walked with a gloomy face and stretched out arms and looked, I think, quite clumsy (at least, that’s how I felt). I remember we had to illustrate a fable. This was closer to our natures and was fun. Later we learned the sword fight between Tybalt and Mercutio from “Romeo and Juliet” and, for greater accuracy, the first performer in the role of Tybalt, Robert Iosifovich Gerbek, was invited to attend our class specially to teach us.
And our graduation class. Under the direction of Margarita Nikolaevna, we presented a remake of Leonid Jakobson’s “Bedbug”. So I graduated with the role of Mayakovsky.
And if you take into account that later I was lucky enough to perform Tybalt and Mayakovsky in actual theatre performances, then it’s possible to say that the basis and foundation for these roles I learned while I was still in school during the Acting Technique classes, but I say that not without humor. In the theatre, there was in fact a completely different sort of training, and nothing like our merry group in the school theatre.
How do you prepare roles then? Do they grow with you over time?
I prepared my first roles myself alone, quite thoroughly. I started with the Duke in “Romeo and Juliet”, Gurn from “La Sylphide”, and Hilarion from “Giselle”. I recorded the music and videos. Then, in front of the mirror with earphones on, I tried to create the role, phrase by musical phrase. The hardest for me was combining the text with the music. I knew the text. I knew the music! But as soon as you start to combine them, you end up with a mess. If previously the text just came out quickly, then now the music is stopping somewhere in the middle. And even if you do everything ten times in the studio correctly, it’s too soon to relax, because when you go on stage that first time, for sure it will all be completely different than you rehearsed.
You’ll probably ask where’s the pedagogue at this point, why are you doing it all alone? Because with the role of the Duke for example, I don’t recall how it came up. Gennady Bababin (mentioned previously) performed that role at that time and he showed me how it went. He demonstrated it very well, but not all of it. It is an acting part that is extremely rich as a character. And prior to that I didn’t know it was. So what is there to be learned? I relied on modesty and didn’t insist on many hours of rehearsal. But I had to arrive at a result somehow.
I prepared the role of Gurn in the same way. Bababin (the first performer of this role in our theatre by the way; the role of Elsa was performed by Mariana von Rosen), explained everything to me in great detail: what, when, where and why. The rest I did myself, again using earphones, the studio, the mirror. “The mirror is a hypocrite, a frenemy who will betray you as soon as you turn your back.” – Maurice Béjart. I like the way he said that. That’s exactly how it is. The mirror only shows us what we want to see. But I didn’t know that at the time. And I had other things to worry about.
Photo above: Nikolai Naumov as Girei with Anastasia Kolegova in “The Fountain of Bakchisarei”.
With Hilarion, everything was spontaneous. The company went on tour and at the stage door, I encountered Tatiana Gumba [who handled casting] and who was getting on the bus. Suddenly she turns to me and says “Naumov, you’re going to perform Hilarion” and then she disappears into the dark doorway. After I “came to”, I had a full six days to my debut. And to learn the order of the steps? Babanin! I rehearsed with the record player alone for the most part. Two days prior to the performance someone appointed a pedagogue to me, Redgepmirat Abdiev. I worked myself to death for 6 days such that I had no strength left over to worry on the day of the performance.
Of course, that was just the start. Later on I had other roles and other wonderful pedagogues, about whom I’ve already spoken. My experience grew. But with experience also comes more roles. I master them, I grow roots in them and feel at home. And in mastering them, they start to gradually, very, very slowly become something recognizable. Of course, the authority and roles created my predecessors loom overhead. And it’s great that they exist! But you shouldn’t compare yourself with them. Each person, each dancer has the right to be themselves onstage and not resemble those who came before them. When working on a role, you do not need to copy the master (although at the start this can work), but to try, with time, as immediately it doesn’t work, but try over time to become accustomed to the roles, to find and feel yourself in them. Only if you offer your own version decorated with your individual interpretation of the role, does the chance arise to truly enjoy the creative process.
Photo above: Nikolai Naumov as Crassus in Jakobson’s “Spartacus”
You’ve been attending classes, rehearsals and performances for 30 years. From where do you draw your strength?
Over the last 10 years my workload has been reduced considerably. Although yes, I attend classes. But a big acting role is also an expenditure. You give out your strength, your energy. But at the same time, you undoubtedly receive something in return. Enjoyment, for example. But you have to pay for that pleasure. So it’s an endless cycle. You give, you receive, you give again, and so forth. I have few performances, I’d gladly perform more often. I love my job. I love being on stage. To sum up: first of all, the roles don’t require you to expend too much strength or energy but secondly, a good performance gives you energy back, keeps you in shape to work on further achievements.
Your favorite role?
I love all of my roles. There are not so many of them that I can be choosy. Some of them I took a long time to get used to and others quickly became “mine”. Girei from “The Fountain of Bakchisarei” is the role I performed the longest. I probably performed it more than my other roles. I can’t say that I felt at home in immediately like a fish in water, but I prepared it for a long time with Korneev. But by the end of my Girei’s life, it seemed for a second that I managed to make him worthwhile. Even now when I suddenly run into former colleagues or even viewers who have attended my performances, they mention my Girei with kind words. I’ve received the greatest number of compliments about that role specifically. The nicest was when fellow dancers told me their impressions and nothing caused them to do it aside from sincerity. They all intrigued me because you can never see yourself from the side – as videos don’t count.
Incidentally the role of Mayakovsky in “The Bedbug” and the role of Tybalt in “Romeo” both of which I prepared in school, I enjoyed them both a great deal. But I didn’t manage to reach maturity in them, I didn’t have a chance. I think about that at times with grateful sadness.
The role of Don Quixote is a comparatively new acquisition of mine which I did not expect! At first there was a lot of sweat and little point to it. I felt very uncomfortable in it. But now I love that role. I even received a compliment from a kind professional about that role, so it must mean I’m growing in it.
Lorenzo, Kitri’s father in “Don Quixote”, also did not immediately square away. I couldn’t see myself in this exaggerated character. Nothing. The years passed. And finally we have gelled. So much so that I’m even thinking about making some changes if I have the chance to do so.
I am sorry about Abdurakhman from “Raymonda”. I really wanted that role. But fate ‘protected’ me from him.
Crassus and the Great Brahmin (the latter shown in the photo at right) are monumental characters who are quite complex to portray. Especially Crassus. He’s greatly deprived of not just choreography but pantomime (in the Jakobson version) yet he’s on stage for quite a long time. And you have to fill up this active emptiness on your own. Even reading “Spartacus” by Raffaello GIovagnoli didn’t help me much. But it definitely added colors to the role of Crassus. I always read whatever is written about my characters. Any additional knowledge about them can help us get a little bit closer to them. They become more understandable. I have not yet read Cervantes’ “Don Quixote”. The role created by Cherkasov in 1957 impressed me so much that it seems no book can provide more information about the stylistics of this hero.
I won’t torment you more with my memories. I’ll summarize my answer: I love all my roles. Even those that are portrayed less well than others or that are a bit snug on me, I love them too! “After all, you have to love the rebels” comes to mind, a quotation from the book “We” by Zamyatin.
Does the idea of emploi exist?
I think the idea of it exists, but in the form that it used to be? No. There is a general tendency in the world to combine, simplify, optimize, you know…two in one, three in one, better yet five in one and for the price of one. Quality sinks, but it’s beneficial. For whom? Certainly not for the user. I’m not saying that it happens this way here. But that’s the direction of my thoughts.
How do you recover if you have vacation?
Recently I have started going to the ocean with my son, as is popular now. I love it! I love the mountains (well that combines with the sea). I love the forest. Mushrooms! My relatives have a dacha near Vyborg at the Deep Lake and I escape there with my son if we’re lucky.
What’s the hardest part of your job?
The waiting. I can have long stretches without performances. And in some ways, that’s degradation. The loss of that time grieves me. And as a result, unsuccessful performances and stress. This is where the mountains help! Nothing so obvious portrays all of the nothingness of our problems as failures (and achievements, by the way, too), as looking at the world from a mountaintop. It’s true that you have to be there alone to obtain this perspective on life. Or, at least, alone with someone close to you.
What’s the best part of your job?
The performances of course! The makeup, costumes. I love doing it all myself, everything that I can. I do my own makeup, I put on my costume. I indulge in the process. Sometimes, it’s true, the wind up to the celebration is better than the celebration itself, but that happens. And yes, I almost forgot: going on tour! Thanks to my job, I’ve seen many parts of the world, and I love that.
Let me talk a bit more about the main topic of this interview for a minute, “acting technique”, as I don’t discuss this every day and I have to say it, mostly for myself. To recall what I know about acting? Well, I know that finding the approach means finding the character. I know that first comes the idea, then the gaze of the eyes, and then the action. Here a phrase comes to mind, “pay attention to your thoughts, because thoughts initiate actions.” Gestures have to be large, certain, expansive. You should not shorten them or toss them off. The gesture depends a on the character of the role. Not all heroes are the same, but the stage requires largesse.
Photo above right: Naumov presents a bouquet to Olesya Novikova in “Margerite et Armand”.
You have to always “hear out your partner” before responding [in pantomime]. So it’s necessary to know what your partner is “telling” you. You have to think up an internal text that you can use later at the appropriate moment. The necessary thought gives the necessary glance and then a necessary, befitting situation and a natural, harmonious and understandable gesture … in theory. Since we work on a stage and not in an arena, you have to be situated in the space so that more of your face is towards the audience. Your eyes and hands are very important, your wrists in particular. I’ve probably left something out. Is it really that easy? Why then do you look at one dancer and he captures the essence of a character, while another doing the same thing even stronger, more expansively, more audaciously, looks like a goofball. That’s unkind, I know. But that’s how it is.
I’ve been in that situation myself. After the premiere of Signore Capulet in “Romeo and Juliet” for which I earnestly prepared and where, I thought, I could show myself in not such a bad light, two young men in the studio in front of me the next day were talking. They were from the Pantomime Extras Department and their chat turned to the latest performance of “Romeo”. One asked the other, “What happened to Ponomarev? Why is there some idiot on stage now in his place?” After that revelation I could have hung myself. But sentiments aside, “A fool onstage is immediately visible”. I don’t know who said that, but it’s true. Except we always tend to think that this epithet can’t refer to us.
I feel lucky because it’s rare that you hear the truth about yourself. Our impression of ourselves often strongly differs from what others think about us. And the greater this disparity, the more comical the individual looks with his self-opinion. Although being a comedian is also a talent by the way. It’s not worth despairing!
Despite the fact that today’s conversation has led me back to the Socratic “I know that I do not know anything”, I prefer to remain an optimist. There’s one other famous quote begging to be spoken: “There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist except an old optimist.” Despite the fact that in this context I only suit the role of the old optimist, and according to Mark Twain I should be a more woeful spectacle, I wouldn’t want to change anything in my attitude. In the end, only our bodies age. The soul, especially that of artists – dancers—is eternally youthful and even a bit childlike. After all, we’re acting …
Photographs from Nikolai Naumov’s personal archives and the Mariinsky Theatre.