Imperial Dancer: Mathilde Kschessinska and the Romanovs (26 page)

Rumours abounded and the scandal was immense. The affair was hushed up but it would surface again and be the source of more trouble for Mathilde.

In 1911 Mathilde celebrated twenty years of dancing on the Imperial stage, and according to tradition she should now retire. She was thirty-eight, but still continued the same punishing schedule to retain her fitness.

Every year before the season commenced Julie and a few trusted friends attended a rehearsal to tell Mathilde whether she should still appear on the stage. If Mathilde was going to retire, and so far there were no signs, she wanted to do so at the peak of her career. As she wrote in her memoirs: ‘It is an error frequently made to retire only when strength is beginning to fail, and thus to leave a poor impression.’
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Although Mathilde admitted to feeling nervous in the wings, afraid of spoiling her reputation, all fears vanished as she began to dance.

For her twentieth anniversary a benefit performance was arranged for Sunday 13 February. She wanted Nijinsky as her partner but he refused, claiming he was not fully fit after a recent illness. Mathilde was therefore angry to learn that he would be dancing
Giselle
with Karsavina in January.

Mathilde was desperate to dance
Giselle
that season to prove to Diaghilev that she could perform the Romantic ballets, but the rift with Teliakovsky widened further when he announced a second performance of
Giselle
with Karsavina and Nijinsky. Bronislava Nijinska claimed that Kschessinska then swore that she would engineer the dismissal of several of the Innovators, starting with Nijinsky because he had refused to dance at her benefit, and then his sister for inciting the dancers by spreading revolutionary propaganda.

On 24 January Nijinsky danced
Giselle
with Karsavina, wearing the costume designed by Benois when Diaghilev’s company performed in Paris. It did not include the normal trunks worn for modesty over the dancer’s tights. ‘The royal box was occupied by the Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna, two Grand Duchesses, several ladies-in-waiting and Prince [
sic
] Sergei Michaelovich.’ The director’s box opposite was empty. Teliakovsky was in Moscow.
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According to Bronislava Nijinska, in the interval between the ballet’s acts Nijinsky was forced to appear on stage so that Andrei (other sources say Sergei) could check his costume before he performed again before the Dowager Empress. Nijinsky at first refused, but was eventually prevailed upon to agree. The Grand Duke saw his costume and left the stage so that the performance could continue. Afterwards, he allegedly telephoned Baron Frederiks and transmitted the Dowager Empress’s order for Nijinsky’s dismissal. The Directorate then maintained that the Dowager Empress, shocked to the core by Nijinsky’s costume, had swept out of the theatre brushing aside the obsequious officials as she went. The scandal was the talk of St Petersburg.
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However, the Duchess of Coburg, a Russian Grand Duchess by birth who was staying with Miechen, described the event somewhat differently. Calling Nijinsky a ‘spoilt dancer’ of the Imperial Theatre, she told her daughter how, before the second ballet, the theatre manager called out one of her cousins. The Grand Duke (she did not say which) came back and said that the dancer had on ‘an impossible costume’ which he refused to change.

When Nijinsky appeared in a short velvet jacket (‘apricot’), which ‘showed every bit of his body’, the Duchess related how ‘Aunt Minnie [the Dowager Empress], her daughters and myself’ went into ‘boundless fits of laughter’. Everyone looked at the Imperial box and soon the whole theatre was laughing. The sight was so funny that ‘even Aunt Minnie forgot to be shocked’. The incident was later reported to the Tsar.
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In a conversation with Count Benckendorff, the Grand Marshal of the Imperial Court, the Dowager Empress denied that she was shocked, saying ‘It must have been a joke on the part of those “young boys”.’ She was referring to Sergei and Andrei. The inference is that Kschessinska’s entourage was involved in Nijinsky’s dismissal. The Dowager Empress later stated that she did not intend to make any protest about the dancer’s costume and, indeed, if she had seen ‘anything indecent, then she would have pretended not to have noticed it’. According to Serge Lifar, it was the Grand Duke who was shocked.
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The Dowager Empress continued to patronise the Diaghilev ballet in London when Nijinsky was performing. It is unlikely she would have done so had his appearance upset her in any way.

Bronislava Nijinska saw Mathilde’s hand behind every plot against her brother and blamed ‘two friends’ of Mathilde for making mischief.
A late 1915 issue of
The Theatre
also indirectly pointed the finger at Kschessinska, ‘the fixed star in the Imperial firmament, [who] wanted Nijinsky to appear with her in one of the ballets of the stereotyped Italian school. He, on the other hand, preferred …
Giselle
.’
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Yet it is much more likely that Diaghilev, who wanted his lover Nijinsky to be free to join his own new company, encouraged him to wear the costume, guessing what would follow. Nijinsky was contracted to serve in the Imperial Theatres for five years and during that time would have to rely on leave of absence to dance abroad. His dismissal left him free to join the Ballets Russes de Serge de Diaghilev. Alternatively, the whole thing may have been engineered by Nijinsky himself.

When Teliakovsky returned from Moscow and learnt that Baron Frederiks had sanctioned Nijinsky’s dismissal without consulting him, he resorted to making guesses in his diary as to why his discharge had been engineered. He recorded the rumour that it was due to Kschessinska’s influence. The chief source of this tittle-tattle was Ludmilla Schollar, the young dancer who had partnered Nijinsky at his graduation. Mathilde allegedly summoned the girl to her dressing room and informed her bluntly that she was not responsible for Nijinsky’s departure and, indeed, that if she was in a position to have people dismissed from the company she would quite naturally have started with the gossip Schollar.
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The mystery was never solved.

For her benefit performance Mathilde summoned Nicolai Legat. The programme consisted of the first act of
Don Quixote
, the second act of
Paquita
(with a showpiece
pas-de-deux
for Mathilde and Legat); and the second act of
Fiametta
, which she said brought back lovely memories. This ballet, in which Cupid (danced by Karsavina) orders Fiametta (Kschessinska) to fascinate a rakish young nobleman who does not believe in love and then cede him nothing, was one of the Tsar’s favourites which he loved to see Mathilde dance.

Fokine’s
Chopiniana
was also included in the programme, but on 8 February the
St Petersburg Gazette
published an interview in which Mathilde attacked Fokine. Denying that she had previously refused to appear in his ballets she said that in her opinion they contained ‘little dancing … the ballerina has little to do’. She told the reporter that she wanted to take part in all the chief strengths of the Imperial Theatres and did not think it possible to leave out Fokine.
Chopiniana
had beautiful lines and at least gave the ballerina a slight chance to
display her technical knowledge. ‘To be able to perform Fokine’s ballets, it is really not necessary to be able to dance,’ she added. Fokine was offended. His ideas were gaining more and more support from Teliakovsky and Kschessinska was causing no end of problems.

The Tsar, both Empresses and most members of the Imperial family were in the audience on 13 February. Mathilde designed a souvenir programme with her photograph on the first page (a novelty at that time) and, inside, a list of all the ballets in which she had danced and all the artists who had participated. ‘The performance was really very beautiful,’ Nicholas wrote in his diary.
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After
Fiametta
Mathilde chose Karsavina to lead her on for the curtain calls. ‘I felt both touched and honoured,’ Karsavina recalled some sixty-five years later.
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During the first interval the Director presented Mathilde with the Emperor’s present – an outstretched diamond eagle on a platinum chain, from which was suspended a rose sapphire set in diamonds. Sergei then said that the Emperor had requested that she appear on stage wearing the jewel. This was an Imperial command that Mathilde was only too happy to obey and she wore it to dance
Paquita
. The performance of
Chopiniana
merited no mention in Mathilde’s memoirs. It did not receive a good reception from the critics.

During the second interval artists from all branches of the Imperial theatres paid tribute. The presents Mathilde received that evening were truly magnificent. From Andrei there was a diamond diadem with six cabochon sapphires (a more valuable copy by Fabergé of the gilt diadem Prince Schervashidze had designed for
Pharaoh’s Daughter
). A few months earlier Mathilde had a new wig made with a centre parting which she wore with the bandeau. The hairstyle pleased her so much that she adopted it for everyday wear.

From Sergei there was a very valuable gift – a mahogany chest in a gold mounting, containing yellow diamonds of all different sizes which were eventually made up into a corsage ornament by Fabergé. Other gifts bought from Fabergé by admirers included an elephant made from pink rhodonite with ruby eyes, and an enamel powder case on a gold frame. The subscribers collected £1,000 to buy a green malachite Louis XVI table with a silver rim, a full tea service, a diamond watch on a diamond and platinum chain, and some gold cups. From the Moscow balletomanes there was a silver vase standing on a Louis XV mirror in a silver frame. In the mirror could be seen the names of all the donors engraved on the bottom of the vase. There were enough bouquets on the stage to fill a garden.

A few days later the St Petersburg balletomanes invited Mathilde to a lavish dinner at Cubat’s. Mathilde preserved the photographs taken that night with the participants’ names written underneath. Almire Cubat had once been the Tsar’s cook and his restaurant was a favourite of Mathilde, who spent thousands of roubles when she threw parties there.

That season Andrei often entertained the leading artists of the theatre at his palace. Younger members of the Imperial family were sometimes present and often the dancing went on until dawn. At one of these parties Mathilde met Grand Duke Dimitri Pavlovich, nineteen-year-old son of Grand Duke Paul. ‘Young, handsome, charming’, a great favourite of the Tsar who treated him like a second son, Dimitri was at that time an officer in the Horse Guards.
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Dimitri virtually lived with the Tsar and Tsarina in the years before the First World War and was considered a possible husband for their eldest daughter Olga.

At the end of February Victor Dandré was arrested and on 6 April the
Atlanta Journal
in the United States reported: ‘In some mysterious way some favourite at the palace – oh, a lady, of course, and a jealous one – got word to America that Anna [Pavlova], who has been dancing over here, had received a big share of the small fortune which a certain M. Dandré is accused of having looted from the Russian treasury.’

According to Pavlova, ‘It was some jealous old cat who started the story.’ It is hard to resist the conclusion that Pavlova meant Kschessinska. By the autumn Pavlova had paid Dandré’s bail and he slipped quietly out of Russia. According to gossip among Pavlova’s company, Dandré’s arrest was connected with ‘the misuse of a Grand Duchess’s milk fund’.
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In the spring Mathilde and Andrei left for Monte Carlo.

In the summer of 1911 London was the place to be. The coronation of King George V and Queen Mary was to take place in June and Diaghilev’s company, billed as the Imperial Russian Ballet, would be arriving on 19 June to dance in a gala performance at Covent Garden. The streets were decorated with flags, bunting and portraits of the King and Queen. A new stage was laid down at the Royal Opera House, a magnificent pair of heavy gold plush curtains, embroidered with the royal monogram, were hung and plush red replaced the former green carpet and interior decoration of the private boxes. Among the royalty in London for the coronation were the Tsar’s brother Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich and Mathilde’s old admirer Prince Chakrabongse of Siam.

Also in London was Anna Pavlova, scoring a tremendous success
with Michael Mordkin at the Palace Theatre. The couple had recently quarrelled and Pavlova allegedly slapped his face on stage. The Tsar adored Pavlova. He sent her an inscribed gold medal with his portrait, pleased that she was showing the Russian ballet to so many other countries.

On Monday 30 May/12 June it was suddenly announced that Pavlova had been taken ill while dancing and would not be able to continue. She was due to appear on 13 and 14 June and the theatre management were thrown into a panic. The capital was seething with visitors and there were plenty of rival attractions. That evening the manager, Alfred Butt, sent a telegram to Kschessinska in Monte Carlo.

Within hours Mathilde was on a train bound for London. Despite heavy bookings, by the time she arrived a river suite had been made available at the Savoy Hotel. No doubt the name of Grand Duke Andrei quite literally opened many doors. Mathilde immediately threw a lavish reception for all the society ladies she had met in St Petersburg, announcing in French that she had ‘come over from Russia to dance with Mordkin at the Palace during Pavlova’s indisposition’. As the visit had been arranged at rather short notice, she could only remain in the capital for two weeks. Mathilde made no secret of her wish to make her mark on London, where she was so far unknown.
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