Two one-act ballets for children — Bambi and In the Jungle. Have one thing in common — their story is based on the famous novel by Felix Salten Bambi, A Life in the Woods, a story of a little white-tailed deer, and its sequel, Bambi’s Children. The two ballets are performed on the same evening and meant as a family event. The performances are planned on Saturday and Sunday so that parents and their children can spend this weekend together in the company of their favorite fairy-tale characters.
The charming Bambi story transferred from the Mariinsky Theatre main stage to its Primorsky branch is the first opening of the fourth season in the Mariinsky Theatre Primorsky Stage. In 2015 these one-act ballets opened the 15th International Mariinsky Ballet Festival making a big artistic event of the cultural life in St. Petersburg. Soon they were included in the regular repertoire of the theatre. The shows were staged by Anton Pimonov, one of the most promising young choreographers of the Mariinsky company, and Anna Matison, a well-known Russian theatre director, who also was a librettist and a stage designer of the show.
The authors of the ballets set a very complex and noble objective — treating children with great respect they do their best to speak with them about permanent life values as an equal. Breathtaking adventures of the brave little deer and his friends make an example of good and generosity for the young audience, teaching to value friendship and never give up in front of any obstacles.
To make the fairy-tale not only teaching something but also exciting, the two ballets are created short and vividly colorful with a lot of forest animal characters — a squirrel, a hare, a fox, a hedgehog, magpies, a grasshopper and a butterfly — the dancers wear bright color costumes and imitate animal movements. Also true music lovers will be pleased with the score composed for Bambi and In the Jungle by composers Andrey Golovin and Alexander Lokshin.
Nadezhda Koulygina
