PNB turns old documents into a new 'Giselle'

A notebook found in a German flea market; an 1842 music manuscript; a document written in now-archaic notation sitting dormant for decades on a Harvard library shelf — these are the puzzle pieces from which a team at Pacific Northwest Ballet is putting together a new version of the classic ballet "Giselle."

A romantic tragedy about a young girl who dies of a broken heart (only to return as a ghost, in a troupe of dead-before-their-wedding-night women known as the Wilis), "Giselle" is one of the oldest still-performed ballets, dating from 1841. Originally choreographed by Jean Coralli and Jules Perrot for what is now the Paris Opera, the ballet currently exists in many forms, most related to the late 19th-century version based on the original and staged by master choreographer Marius Petipa, for Russia's Imperial Ballet.

Peter Boal, artistic director of PNB, had long wanted to add "Giselle" to the company's repertory, but couldn't find a version that felt right. "I found beautiful 'Giselles,' " he said, "but they belonged to other companies. It felt like we would just be re-creating what another company had done well, not like we would have our individual unique Giselle."

Enter Doug Fullington, a PNB staffer and dance historian who happens to be an expert in reading Stepanov notation, a now-archaic form of classical ballet notation used in Russia. Around 1900, a ballet master at the Imperial Ballet, Nikolai Sergeyev, used this notation to stage several versions of "Giselle" in Paris and London. Sergeyev's documents eventually ended up at the Harvard Theatre Collection. "It hasn't been consulted at all, not since the '40s," said Fullington. "It's just sitting there at Harvard. We're the first ones to use it."

Boal was intrigued by the idea of reconstructing the ballet from historical sources, and Fullington brought in Marian Smith, a musicologist/dance historian at the University of Oregon, as an adviser for the project. Author of the book "Ballet and Opera in the Age of Giselle," Smith was well-versed in the ballet's origins — and on two other key sources that the PNB trio would use.

One only recently came to light — from, of all places, a flea market in Regensburg, Germany, in 2002. It's a book handwritten by Henri Justament, a ballet master for the Paris Opera in the 1860s, with essentially the entire staging of the ballet sketched out. Each scene is drawn, with little stick figures — the women in red, the men in black — and with notations in French describing what is happening.

"No one has really made a full study of this manuscript," said Smith, showing a facsimile copy of it. "It's possible that [Justament] was in on 'Giselle' at the Paris Opera at the time of its last run there, in the 1860s. We don't know that. But he may well have seen it, and he may well have notated what he saw. This is taken as a bible."

Smith also pointed to a third source: a facsimile of a music manuscript of Adolphe Adam's score for "Giselle," from 1842, with copious notes written in it by ballet master Antoine Titus. (The original currently resides at the Theater Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia.) "The great value and wonderment of this one is that it shows how the music matches up to the action," said Smith. "Not only does it show you the way the composer and choreographer worked together to make it work, as a team, music and action, but it shows you the mentality behind it. So even if there's someplace that is not notated so carefully, you can get a sense for how it works."

With the Stepanov notation as a primary source for choreography, the Justament book for mime and action scenes, and the music manuscript tying it all together, the trio began its work, starting with some of the mime sequences. As various versions of "Giselle" evolved in the 20th century, the mime and action scenes were the most likely to be dropped, Fullington said — "it went out of fashion to do codified mime gestures, so you would replace those gestures with some sort of action that didn't require real pantomime." (The "Giselle" program at PNB will contain a brief guide to the pantomime gestures, to assist audiences unfamiliar with the story.)

Also, "Giselle" was in the past often staged on a double bill with another ballet, so many scenes would be cut for time. (It's shorter than most story ballets; just two acts.) Smith said that it was always staged as a double bill at the Paris Opera in the 19th century, and Fullington noted that for a 20th-century London production numerous bars of the musical score were cut — "very unmusical cuts, just to get to the heart of the dancing. They would just barrel through it."

As Boal, Fullington and Smith work to re-create scenes not generally part of a modern "Giselle," bits of information have dropped into place through their research. Fullington notes that a scene in the beginning of Act II, involving an old man and a group of hunters, appeared to be a comedic scene based on the sources, so the PNB team staged it as such. "But then I'd second-guess," he said, "and think — well, maybe it was serious for them then?" But they found out that the performer playing the old man was a famous comic actor of the day, which confirmed their interpretation.

Though they are faithfully following the historical sources, all acknowledge that occasionally, something just doesn't work and will be replaced. "We're so far from that time period," said Fullington of the original "Giselle." "Our bodies are different ... aesthetics are different." If a combination doesn't feel right, to both the dancers and the stagers, it may be altered to "something more logical that carries the same essence," said Boal.

But they've been fascinated to see how the score speaks for itself, telling the story. "We ran through something today without telling the dancers what was happening (in the story)," said Boal, "and they just nailed it. It's right there in the music."

Once all the pieces are put together, the final result will be a tragic love story entwined with a ghost story; an enduringly popular ballet (it's been included in a number of movies, including "The Turning Point" and "Dancers") with an irresistible title character. Smith, in an essay for the "Giselle" program, calls the young woman at the ballet's center "the very embodiment of the contrast between the real and unreal worlds ... She is a sparkly, high-spirited young person whose ghostly return in Act Two as a Wili makes for a stunning character transformation."

Many eyes will be on this new-yet-old "Giselle" — indeed, the Dance Critics Association has elected to hold its annual meeting in Seattle during the ballet's run. And while the PNB trio, when interviewed, had yet to see the full ballet come together, they spoke with obvious pleasure about the challenges and rewards of the project.

"I learn something every day," said Smith, of the process in which three 21st-century interpreters listen carefully to voices from more than a century ago. "All the continuity created in the choreography, the mime action scenes — each scene hooks up to another so well, with little transitions. These people knew what they were doing. They knew their way around a stage. It's nice to be able to get some of their ideas."

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com