Kay's Interview of Rudolf Nureyev: 6/30/1963
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Eugene (Oregon) Register-Guard Women's Editor Kay Lundeen (a.k.a. Will's younger daughter) scores - by hook or by crook - an interview with a world-famous ballet dancer
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1963-06-30: tour stops---images---audio---~TRANSCRIPT~---notes---links---site navigation
Rudolf Nureyev Finds Freedom in Dancing
By KAY LUNDEEN
Register-Guard Women's Editor
Rudolf Nureyev "dashes to freedom" daily -- and finds it in his dancing.
Like a graceful bird he soars into the air, unfettered by ties to earth, and as he bounds upward his face lights up with sheer joy at his own unrestrained movement.
"I live in the world. I won't be attached to one spot like a puppet," he says with an insistence that seems to come from having so many fail to understand.
For ever since 1961 when he left the Kirov Ballet Company at the Paris airport and defected to the West, Nureyev has been hounded by reporters, political writers and others anxious to hear him denounce his Russian homeland and all that he left behind.
"You people try to have me say the things YOU want me to say," he protests. "You want me to say that there is freedom here, that there is not freedom in Russia. But that is not true. I don't care what you write about me. I dance -- that is what is important to me."
Nureyev's remarks came as he sprinted along a downtown Portland street one morning the past week during The Royal Ballet's three-day appearance there. The night before he had electrified the audience, as he has so many before, with his superb portrayal of Albrecht in "Giselle." This was the role he danced with Dame Margo Fonteyn, when he made his debut with the company in London a little more than a year ago and she was his partner in the Portland performance.
The following morning Nureyev consented to be interviewed as he dashed from his hotel to Ballet House where the Royal Ballet company's classes were being conducted during their Portland stay.
"I'm late for my lesson," he explained as he took long strides down the street. His thick brown hair, cut in elfin style, flew in the breeze and he occasionally brushed back the long locks with a quick sweep of his hand.
Fleet as a young deer, he was preceded along the busy street by Register-Guard photographer Phil Wolcott who ran backwards as he snapped picture after picture. One passerby called out to the dancer, "Magnificent performance!" and without lessening his pace, Nureyev acknowledged the tribute with a warm "Thank you!"
Arriving at an intersection, he found the street light signal said "WAIT", but unconcerned he dashed across in front of the line of cars. It was the traffic that waited.
Leaping up the three flights of stairs to the studio, he quickly changed into black leotard and tights and joined the class being conducted by Michael Somes, assistant director of the Royal Ballet.
Even as he works out, Nureyev is an impelling figure, graceful to his fingertips. Lean and lithe, he bears the mark of his Tartar ancestry in his face with its high cheekbones, concave cheeks and deep-set almond-shaped eyes, slanting slightly upward at the outer edges. He says he thinks of himself as a Tartar, as are his parents, rather than as a Russian.
After the hour's workout, Nureyev appeared to be more relaxed and less suspicious. He read with apparent interest a newspaper review of the Giselle performance the evening before as well as an account of a local interview with him. Asked if he had been quoted accurately, he said that for the most part he had, then added:
"But it says here I said that 'five days after I leave Portland, I'll have been forgotten.' That is not correct. I did not say that. I said that 'five days after I leave Portland, I will have forgotten.' This place, this performance, it gave me something that I will keep, but I will forget the place because in five days I will be somewhere else working -- and I cannot look back. I am only concerned with what I am doing now."
Gradually expanding on his feelings, his aspirations, the 25-year-old Nureyev voiced these ideas:
As he talked quietly and intensely, his eyes shone with child-like sparkle. The darting look of suspicion was gone. More than ever it was apparent that here was an artist whose mind was too filled with his aspirations for beauty through his art to have any desire to discuss international politics. For him, ballet is confined within no political border.
Nureyev's decision to remain in the West apparently doesn't make him feel obligated to denounce all that he left behind. Although he looks to the future, he surely has left behind many happy memories -- of the Kirov Ballet and his teacher Pushkin, of the dancers with whom he studied and later performed, of his own family which includes his mother, father and three sisters.
Later in the early afternoon the dancer returned to Ballet House for a rehearsal with Fonteyn. While Nureyev was dancing in the classroom beyond, Sergei Dare, director of Ballet House, related how he went backstage to his dressing room following the performance of Giselle. He told the dancer, "I've seen every Albrecht for 50 years and I was never moved quite so deeply as tonight. You are the greatest Albrecht I have ever seen."
According to Dare, "Nureyev wasn't out of character yet. He was still Albrecht. After I had spoken, he wept." Dare added:
"He is even greater than Nijinsky. He has sensitivity, humility and ability. He shows off his ballerina to the nth degree. He is self-effacing. He is absolutely unspoiled and he has the world in his hands."
But Nureyev, it would seem, may prefer to reach his hands unencumbered toward the clouds as he finds his freedom -- in dancing.
By KAY LUNDEEN
Register-Guard Women's Editor
Rudolf Nureyev "dashes to freedom" daily -- and finds it in his dancing.
Like a graceful bird he soars into the air, unfettered by ties to earth, and as he bounds upward his face lights up with sheer joy at his own unrestrained movement.
"I live in the world. I won't be attached to one spot like a puppet," he says with an insistence that seems to come from having so many fail to understand.
For ever since 1961 when he left the Kirov Ballet Company at the Paris airport and defected to the West, Nureyev has been hounded by reporters, political writers and others anxious to hear him denounce his Russian homeland and all that he left behind.
"You people try to have me say the things YOU want me to say," he protests. "You want me to say that there is freedom here, that there is not freedom in Russia. But that is not true. I don't care what you write about me. I dance -- that is what is important to me."
Nureyev's remarks came as he sprinted along a downtown Portland street one morning the past week during The Royal Ballet's three-day appearance there. The night before he had electrified the audience, as he has so many before, with his superb portrayal of Albrecht in "Giselle." This was the role he danced with Dame Margo Fonteyn, when he made his debut with the company in London a little more than a year ago and she was his partner in the Portland performance.
The following morning Nureyev consented to be interviewed as he dashed from his hotel to Ballet House where the Royal Ballet company's classes were being conducted during their Portland stay.
"I'm late for my lesson," he explained as he took long strides down the street. His thick brown hair, cut in elfin style, flew in the breeze and he occasionally brushed back the long locks with a quick sweep of his hand.
Fleet as a young deer, he was preceded along the busy street by Register-Guard photographer Phil Wolcott who ran backwards as he snapped picture after picture. One passerby called out to the dancer, "Magnificent performance!" and without lessening his pace, Nureyev acknowledged the tribute with a warm "Thank you!"
Arriving at an intersection, he found the street light signal said "WAIT", but unconcerned he dashed across in front of the line of cars. It was the traffic that waited.
Leaping up the three flights of stairs to the studio, he quickly changed into black leotard and tights and joined the class being conducted by Michael Somes, assistant director of the Royal Ballet.
Even as he works out, Nureyev is an impelling figure, graceful to his fingertips. Lean and lithe, he bears the mark of his Tartar ancestry in his face with its high cheekbones, concave cheeks and deep-set almond-shaped eyes, slanting slightly upward at the outer edges. He says he thinks of himself as a Tartar, as are his parents, rather than as a Russian.
After the hour's workout, Nureyev appeared to be more relaxed and less suspicious. He read with apparent interest a newspaper review of the Giselle performance the evening before as well as an account of a local interview with him. Asked if he had been quoted accurately, he said that for the most part he had, then added:
"But it says here I said that 'five days after I leave Portland, I'll have been forgotten.' That is not correct. I did not say that. I said that 'five days after I leave Portland, I will have forgotten.' This place, this performance, it gave me something that I will keep, but I will forget the place because in five days I will be somewhere else working -- and I cannot look back. I am only concerned with what I am doing now."
Gradually expanding on his feelings, his aspirations, the 25-year-old Nureyev voiced these ideas:
- "I am true to myself. My work, it is my truth. Work cures everything. When I work, I have truth. When I am not working, I have no truth -- or perhaps it is truth, but a rather bad one."
- "I am free in myself. I am working -- occupied with my work -- that's the freedom. You can find independence or freedom only in yourself -- not in any other place."
- "You people say that in the West you are free, that in Russia they are not free, but you are wrong. You don't have freedom here. In a society nobody can be free -- you just deceive yourself."
- "One should be more flexible in adjusting to different places. Why do you have to be always stuck in Portland or in America? Why can't you go to Russia or China or the North Pole, if that is where you can work?
- "For me, there are many things to learn in my dancing. I want to imrpove, to learn, to research within myself."
- "Does a role require a great deal of mental preparation? Absolutely. For me, it is like painting a picture. The technique helps to fill in the shadows, but a balanced, developed performance is much more than that."
- "By me at least, every performance is a very designed performance. Those technical things, they are a big part in achieving a dramatic effect -- without them I would lose character or the character would be changed -- but it is not technique that makes the role."
- "In a role you improvise in a way. You know what hand movement is needed, for instance. But it is still all very designed. sometimes there is a failure. I may overact or I may feel I went off line at a certain place. The next performance that will be gone, because I will remember and make the necessary change."
- "I dance only the roles I like. The people who want to know me, they must see me dance. I am interested in choreography, but that takes time. Now I am interested in dancing."
- "What do I do when I am not dancing? I walk a lot. I also like music -- even more than ballet, I believe. I like to listen to Bach, Mozart, Schubert and the modern composers. Schonberg, Shostakovich and others. When I am in New York, I have a record player and records to listen to."
- "Yes, I think it was my destiny to dance. Yes, I am happy. You are happy just to be alive, to be vital, to be working at what you enjoy."
- Asked to comment on the inevitable comparisons of himself to the immortal Nijinsky, Nureyev said simply:
"I hope I am not copying anyone. I want to dance and develop in my own way. It will be well enough to be remembered as Nureyev."
As he talked quietly and intensely, his eyes shone with child-like sparkle. The darting look of suspicion was gone. More than ever it was apparent that here was an artist whose mind was too filled with his aspirations for beauty through his art to have any desire to discuss international politics. For him, ballet is confined within no political border.
Nureyev's decision to remain in the West apparently doesn't make him feel obligated to denounce all that he left behind. Although he looks to the future, he surely has left behind many happy memories -- of the Kirov Ballet and his teacher Pushkin, of the dancers with whom he studied and later performed, of his own family which includes his mother, father and three sisters.
Later in the early afternoon the dancer returned to Ballet House for a rehearsal with Fonteyn. While Nureyev was dancing in the classroom beyond, Sergei Dare, director of Ballet House, related how he went backstage to his dressing room following the performance of Giselle. He told the dancer, "I've seen every Albrecht for 50 years and I was never moved quite so deeply as tonight. You are the greatest Albrecht I have ever seen."
According to Dare, "Nureyev wasn't out of character yet. He was still Albrecht. After I had spoken, he wept." Dare added:
"He is even greater than Nijinsky. He has sensitivity, humility and ability. He shows off his ballerina to the nth degree. He is self-effacing. He is absolutely unspoiled and he has the world in his hands."
But Nureyev, it would seem, may prefer to reach his hands unencumbered toward the clouds as he finds his freedom -- in dancing.
1963-06-30: tour stops---images---audio---transcript---~NOTES~---links---site navigation
1.
The 2007 memorial for Kay ...talks about this interview:
Securing an interview in 1963 with Nureyev, who had recently defected from the Soviet Union, was no small feat. At the time, he was resistant to the American press, which hounded him for political statements. When England's Royal Ballet toured the West Coast, Kay seized the opportunity to interview one of the most sought after and elusive headliners of the day. She drove to Portland, ambushed him when he emerged from a rehearsal, and requested an interview. When he brushed her off, she and a Register-Guard Photographer chased the world-famous dancer down the city streets of Portland. His long, athletic strides proved to be no match for her determination, and he finally surrendered. Her interview, which offered unusual insight on his artistry, won a national press award, one of several which Kay received during her career.
2.
Rudolf Nureyev Finds Freedom in Dancing
Wikipedia says:
Rudolf Khametovich Nureyev (17 March 1938 – 6 January 1993) was a Soviet-born ballet dancer and choreographer. Nureyev is widely regarded as the preeminent male ballet dancer of the 20th century, as well as one of the greatest ballet dancers of all time.
3.
By KAY LUNDEEN
Register-Guard Women's Editor
I don't see an interview with Nureyev being specifically women's news. But Kay loved ballet, and so she went for it anyway.
4.
Fleet as a young deer, he was preceded along the busy street by Register-Guard photographer Phil Wolcott who ran backwards as he snapped picture after picture.
Phil Wolcott sounds like Ginger Rogers, without the heels.
5.
"Yes, I think it was my destiny to dance. Yes, I am happy. You are happy just to be alive, to be vital, to be working at what you enjoy."
There Kay was, doing what she loved, and there Nureyev was, talking to her about doing what he loved. Nice.
The 2007 memorial for Kay ...talks about this interview:
Securing an interview in 1963 with Nureyev, who had recently defected from the Soviet Union, was no small feat. At the time, he was resistant to the American press, which hounded him for political statements. When England's Royal Ballet toured the West Coast, Kay seized the opportunity to interview one of the most sought after and elusive headliners of the day. She drove to Portland, ambushed him when he emerged from a rehearsal, and requested an interview. When he brushed her off, she and a Register-Guard Photographer chased the world-famous dancer down the city streets of Portland. His long, athletic strides proved to be no match for her determination, and he finally surrendered. Her interview, which offered unusual insight on his artistry, won a national press award, one of several which Kay received during her career.
2.
Rudolf Nureyev Finds Freedom in Dancing
Wikipedia says:
Rudolf Khametovich Nureyev (17 March 1938 – 6 January 1993) was a Soviet-born ballet dancer and choreographer. Nureyev is widely regarded as the preeminent male ballet dancer of the 20th century, as well as one of the greatest ballet dancers of all time.
3.
By KAY LUNDEEN
Register-Guard Women's Editor
I don't see an interview with Nureyev being specifically women's news. But Kay loved ballet, and so she went for it anyway.
4.
Fleet as a young deer, he was preceded along the busy street by Register-Guard photographer Phil Wolcott who ran backwards as he snapped picture after picture.
Phil Wolcott sounds like Ginger Rogers, without the heels.
5.
"Yes, I think it was my destiny to dance. Yes, I am happy. You are happy just to be alive, to be vital, to be working at what you enjoy."
There Kay was, doing what she loved, and there Nureyev was, talking to her about doing what he loved. Nice.
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