AFTER Sunday's 3pm screening of Bolshoi Ballet at City Screen, York, Bolshoi principal dancer Anastasia Meskova will join documentary filmmakers Nick Read and Mark Franchetti and historian Simon Sebag Montefiore for a question-and-answer session live via satellite.
The Bolshoi is a symbol of Russia, a national treasure, mystical and intriguing, but the Bolshoi theatre has been making the news for all the wrong reasons: intrigue, personal attacks and management changes have created lurid headlines.
For the first time, however, the theatre directors allowed a film crew access backstage to record the 2013-2014 season in a unique cinematic experience at a time the company saw the coming months as a new chapter.
Executive-produced by Simon Chinn, the two-time Academy Award-winning producer of Man On Wire and Searching For Sugar Man, Bolshoi Babylon gives a voice to artists and company members, not usually in the limelight, in irreverent and candid terms.
Combining epic themes with intimate portraits, historical dramas are counterpointed with the untold personal stories of agony and ecstasy that lie behind every performance.
Unparalleled access behind the scenes lets filmmakers Read and Franchetti pay tribute to the dancers’ artistic and athletic talents, their abiding fear of injury and the ruthless ambition needed to survive in the world’s most famous ballet company.
Tickets can be booked on 0871 902 5726 or at picturehouses.com/cinema/York_Picturehouse
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