BARYSHNIKOV WEIGHS HIS OPTIONS : <i> White Nights and Nutcrackers </i>

Mikhail Baryshnikov strolls into a meeting room in the shabby, spacious and functional old building that houses American Ballet Theatre at 19th Street and Broadway. Even in bright-red practice tights and a blue casual work shirt, he looks eager and businesslike, as a company director should. Closer scrutiny finds him a bit weary and wary, probably with good reason.

The imminent interview represents a pause that may not refresh, a disruption of a difficult rehearsal schedule. Leningrad’s unwitting gift to the Western World is immersed in preparations for a revival of the elaborate “Nutcracker” production he staged in 1977. It will be presented in the vast open spaces of Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles for 17 performances beginning Dec. 20.

He is also preoccupied, as a dancer, with the shaping of a new challenge: Kenneth MacMillan’s setting of the popsy, hyper-eclectic hit Requiem of Andrew Lloyd Webber.

That would be enough to tax any ordinary mortal. But Baryshnikov has his mind--an extraordinarily mercurial, sensitive, probing mind--on some other concerns as well. His career as a dancer is being jeopardized, to some degree, by ankle and knee injuries, not to mention the encroachment of extreme old age. In ballet, some vital statistics are treacherously relative, and Baryshnikov will celebrate his 38th birthday in January.

His career as an ABT impresario has been the subject of some scathing attacks in the press--by critics, editors, even a disgruntled dancer or two. And then there is the increasingly important matter of his career as a movie star.

A few days after the interview, Columbia Pictures would release an extravagant Technicolored compilation of Iron Curtain intrigues, contrived dance interpolations, schlock music and soapy cliches called “White Nights.” It is Baryshnikov’s first film since “The Turning Point,” the art-vs.-domesticity saga that won him a best-supporting-actor nomination for an Oscar in 1977.

In “The Turning Point” he impersonated “a Russian dancer from the moon,” or so he said at the time. In his latest venture on the silver screen, he happens to portray a Russian dancer from Russia who, years after defecting, finds himself plane-wrecked back in the bad, bad, bad Soviet Union.

Although advance reviews for the film itself have been rather negative, most of the critics seem to think that the noblest danseur of them all triumphs over his material.

“Baryshnikov is magnificent in ‘White Nights,’ ” writes Pauline Kael in the New Yorker. “He might have been created for the movie camera, and he shames the movie he’s in.” Later, Kael hedges a bit: “ . . . though he’s an erratic actor, his confident, quick inflections give his lines a comic snap.”

“The show is Baryshnikov’s,” writes Richard Corliss in Time. “He might have been embarrassed at having elements of his autobiography drossed into pulp fiction; instead he displays a muscular, ironic elegance.”

David Ansen in Newsweek finds this a “shamelessly manipulative . . . Reagan-era movie” that contains hardly a scene in the final third “that can be swallowed without gagging.” Nevertheless, our hero “leaves no doubt that he has both the charm and the sexual charisma of a major star.”

The daily newspaper reviews, which follow a week later, echo similar sentiments. “Baryshnikov never has material worthy of him,” complains The Times’ Sheila Benson, who dismisses the dancer-actor’s vehicle as a “turgid, gray-underwear movie.” Vincent Canby in the New York Times finds the screenplay “ludicrous,” adding that the film “is only tolerable when Mr. Baryshnikov is on the screen.”

Obviously, Baryshnikov isn’t just thinking about Christmas-time ballet and mod piety and physical adversity and torturous administrative responsibility. He is also thinking about the Russia he left and still loves, about the Russia depicted in “White Nights,” and, ultimately, about the attraction of new, broader, more commercial possibilities for artistic expression.

Eighteen years after his debut at the Kirov, 11 years after his defection, 9 years after the positive trauma of “Push Comes to Shove,” 7 years after his temporary alliance with Balanchine, 4 years after taking over Ballet Theatre, Baryshnikov finds himself confronting yet another turning point.

The early ads for the “The Nutcracker” at the 6,600-seat Shrine promise nothing as regards casting. They simply herald “Mikhail Baryshnikov’s production.” To some cockeyed optimists, that could imply Baryshnikov’s actual participation in the performances. It shouldn’t.

In the first place, injuries and recent surgery preclude a return to dancing at so early a date. In the second, the “Nutcracker” prince isn’t the sort of challenge that interests him these days.

“I’m not yet 100%,” he explains, “but I am jumping already. With luck I will dance in three works this season, the Lloyd Webber Requiem, David Gordon’s ‘Murder,’ and a premiere by Karole Armitage.” The unnamed last-named, incidentally, promises to be an unusually inventive and eclectic concoction fusing music by Hindemith, Peter Gordon and a group called Shags, dialogue by Mike Nichols and Elaine May (“My Son the Nurse”) and designs by David Salle--just the sort of thing that fascinates the mod Baryshnikov of the mad ‘80s.

Having made only scant Ballet Theatre appearances in recent months, Baryshnikov had intended to assuage his unhappy fans with performances of “Romeo and Juliet” and “Giselle” during the fall season at the Met. There was much agitation in dance circles about his impending partnership with a new ballerina from Covent Garden, Alessandra Ferri. But it wasn’t to be. Instead of becoming a star-cross’d Veronese lover for the first time in America, and instead of assuming the romantic garb of Duke Albrecht one more time, Baryshnikov checked into a local hospital.

“It is difficult to come back at my age,” he sighs. “It takes more time to stretch the ligaments. There is, of course, a danger that the damage could be permanent. I hope not, but one can never be sure with a knee.

“If all goes well, I will may dance for two more years. If everything works OK, I may try ‘Giselle’ again. But I will not keep the other classical ballets.”

And what about the unfulfilled promise of Romeo?

“Well, maybe Romeo.”

Baryshnikov clings to certain ambiguities. Despite prodding, he doesn’t quite make it clear whether he is shrinking his repertory because he is tired of the familiar, traditional challenges or because physical limitations now make those challenges too difficult. The real answer probably involves both reasons.

“After two years, I may stop dancing altogether. Running a company is pretty demanding. On the other hand, if something new, a really special challenge, happens to come along later that suits my temperament and my condition, who knows. . . ?”

The grin is boyish, mischievous, ingenuous.

One thing, he adds, is certain. He won’t follow the example of the many other ex-heroes who eventually find stagy refuge in the character-mime repertory. “No,” he insists. “No Dr. Coppelius, no Madge, no Drosselmeyer for me.”

The opening-night Drosselmeyer at the Shrine will be another thinking-man’s dancer from the Kirov: Alexander Minz, who returns as guest to the role he created in 1977. In Baryshnikov’s production, Drosselmeyer is of special importance. The not-so-old magician functions neither as a supernatural menace nor as an excuse for comic relief. He is suave, dignified, shadowy--a manipulator of destinies, a conjurer of illusion in the real world yet a sober representative of practical truth in little Clara’s dream.

Minz will share the complex, sympathetic assignment here with Clark Tippet, Michael Owen and Raymond Serrano.

“It was difficult when Sascha (Minz) left,” Baryshnikov admits. “The company no longer has the luxury of employing many experienced artists who can specialize in character roles. Obviously, the young dancers lack a certain air of maturity. But it is getting better. They are learning, adapting. Owen is going to be very good in the Tudor ballets, for instance, and Tippet is giving up the classical heroes to concentrate on things like this. He works as ballet master for us now, and is making the transition beautifully.”

Essentially, the “Nutcracker” seen here will be the same presented at the Music Center in 1978 and at various irregular intervals on television. (PBS stations will show the original version Wednesday and Thursday this week.) “We are fixing a few things,” Baryshnikov admits, “refreshening the set, teaching the roles to new dancers, but you cannot expect major changes.”

The new dancers as the very girlish, very unballerina-ish Clara will include Alessandra Ferri who makes her Los Angeles debut the night of Dec. 22. She is the only illustrious newcomer to join the ABT ranks this season. Baryshnikov says that, for the most part, he is more eager to make stars than to import them.

Additional Claras will include Leslie Browne (Baryshnikov’s love-interest in “The Turning Point”), who gets the opening-night assignment, plus such promising members of the younger ABT generation as Amanda McKerrow (Dec. 24 matinee), Deirdre Carberry (Dec. 26 matinee) and Bonnie Moore (Dec. 29 matinee). Marianna Tcherkassky, Baryshnikov’s first heroine in the Tchaikovsky ballet, returns Dec. 21. Gelsey Kirkland, Baryshnikov’s most celebrated, most ethereal, most unreliable and most flighty Clara, remains quasi-mysteriously absent.

“I hear she is well, writing a book somewhere,” Baryshnikov says. “I think she is married and happy, and that she has overcome her troubles. Someone just told me that she is taking class again. I really hope she will do something with her life. I haven’t seen her since she left.”

Following optimistically in Baryshnikov’s formidable footsteps as the nutcracker transformed into the prince of Clara’s gently erotic dreams will be such stalwarts as Kevin McKenzie, Ross Stretton, Danilo Radojevic, Robert La Fosse (opposite Ferri), Patrick Bissell and Johan Renvall. Conspicuously missing from this list is the popular and glamorous Fernando Bujones, who left the company this fall in an acrimonious dispute regarding what he viewed as stagnant repertory and treatment unworthy of a star.

Baryshnikov bristles when Bujones is mentioned.

“It is very simple,” he says. “I will never allow anyone to damage or blackmail the company or myself. Period. The troubles had nothing to do with Bujones’ understandable desire for a ballet by Bejart. Bujones was making demands and threats, and he was denying his commitment to dance for us.

“ ‘Commission a ballet for me,’ he said, ‘right away, or else.’

“Nobody behaves that way. Kenneth MacMillan said that even in the heyday of Rudi (Nureyev) and Margot (Fonteyn), nobody would have dared an approach like that at the Royal Ballet.

“Could he return to us? Jesus Christ! The gap now is very big. If he wants to be with us, he should start from scratch, and withdraw all demands.

“Of course we need stars. We have stars. His claim is nonsense. Cynthia Gregory is not a star? Ferri? Browne? I hope Natasha (Makarova) will come back for some Juliets. Bujones’ behavior is a terrible example to the young dancers. It goes against theater ethics and human ethics.

“It is ridiculous for him, or anyone, to think that I am trying to destroy his career. Actually, I can understand certain of his frustrations. The choreographers of the new ballets do the casting. Ask them why they didn’t use Bujones.”

The suggestion is, of course, rhetorical.

Baryshnikov doesn’t like being a choreographer. In fact, he doesn’t want to be one any more.

“ ‘Nutcraker’ represents all my nostalgia. It still works. In fact, it is probably the best thing I have ever done. That is why you are seeing it again.

“I don’t feel happy about ‘Cinderella.’ It was a tremendous success at the box office, and the board wanted me to repeat it. I refused. It is dead.

“ ‘Don Quixote’ isn’t really my choreography. It is basically Gorsky and Petipa. It comes from a good school. I just dressed it up a little. Maybe it is worth to revive. Maybe.

“And that is it. Finito. Choreography, I know it now, is not my field. It isn’t that I am afraid to take chances, to get burned. It just isn’t right for me. There are far better talents around. It is enough to run a company.”

Perhaps unwittingly, Baryshnikov volunteers an answer to the increasingly vociferous critics who accuse him of absentee or figurehead leadership. “I am working more with the dancers. Daily. Face to face. I am teaching more. That is what I do best.”

He smiles. Nervously.

Although the Lucia Chase days at Ballet Theatre--especially the late days--were often marked by haphazard programming and drastic vacillations in quality, it has become fashionable to look back on that regime as if it represented a golden era. By the same token, it has become fashionable, in crucial, fickle New York circles, to look at Baryshnikov’s BalletTheatre with relative disdain.

Some observers attribute the attacks to extra-artistic considerations: Baryshnikov does not play the social game, does not pal around with the press, does not pay homage to

the external power structure. Other observers suggest that the alienation is justified, that the lofty standards set by Baryshnikov the dancer actually have been compromised by the uneven standards attained by Baryshnikov the company director. The criticism, in any case, has been harsh and unrelenting.

“It hurts,” Baryshnikov admits. “Of course it hurts. I cannot ignore the attacks. But I don’t agree either. I won’t run my company the way Clive Barnes (of the New York Post) wants. If he wants to run a company, he should find one that wants him as artistic adviser. I respect him as a critic, but I don’t have to accept his evaluations.

“Barnes complains, for instance, that I neglect (Antony) Tudor. That is factually incorrect. It is mean. The accusation shows that Barnes has no serious understanding of what the company is going through. He knows perfectly well that Tudor is here every day, that everything is completely up to him: which ballets of his we do, how many, who dances in them. He has carte blanche.

“Naturally, our board is sensitive to criticism. They may not approve of everything I do. But they do not complain in front of my nose. They know it is my job to run the company. If they disapprove, they also can fire me. But the present policies are mine.

“I have made mistakes. Nevertheless, the company is better, stronger now than it was five years ago. That is what counts.”

Baryshnikov accepts no salary for running Ballet Theatre. “I want it that way,” he claims. “After all, I am part of the board. I am involved in fund raising. It would look silly for me to raise money with one hand, take it with the other. That would be a waste of effort.

“Also, because I am not paid, we were able to bring in Kenneth MacMillan and John Taras as associate directors without significantly increasing the budget. The three of us may disagree on matters of taste but, more important, we do agree on company policy, on casting, on moral standards. In any case, final decisions are mine.”

A few iconoclasts have ventured the thought that Baryshnikov works for free because doing so leaves him unbound by financial strings when he wants to take time out for a film or television or a personal engagement elsewhere. He rejects the idea.

“I am paid when I dance, here or someplace else. But it doesn’t matter. Peter Martins is not paid by the New York City Ballet when he works on Broadway. We all do other things, whether paid or not. It is not an issue.”

It has been rumored--reliably, as they say--that Baryshnikov not only works for nothing but also personally underwrites certain pet projects. It is said that he has reached into his own pocket to subsidize experimental ballets that instill fear in the collective conservative heart of his board.

He admits that the company faces a $2-million deficit, although some journals have called it $8 million. “Two-million is close to realistic,” he declares. “It also is unpleasant, but in context not enormous.”

He does not confirm, or deny, his own at-home philanthropy. “A rumor,” he says enigmatically, “is a rumor.”

Subject closed.

Baryshnikov has just watched “White Nights” for the umpteenth time. “Last night I took my young daughter to see it with me at a gala screening. I was worried that she would be upset, especially by the plane crash. I had to assure her that it wasn’t real, just a part of a fairy tale. Oddly, she had to watch her mother (the actress Jessica Lange) survive a plane crash in another film just a few days ago, too.

“It was tense, but in the end, I think she liked it.”

If only everyone liked it.

“Dance is difficult to do in a film,” Baryshnikov says. “The marriage of the two arts isn’t naturally compatible. In ‘White Nights,’ Taylor Hackford (the director and co-producer) tried very had to glue the transition between walking and dancing. He tried to provide dramatic motivation. In fact, he tried to make the dance episodes a dramatic necessity. I think it works pretty well. Not 100%, but pretty well.”

It seems ironic that Baryshnikov, who has steadfastly avoided discussing personal politics until now, should participate in a Hollywoodish manifestation of cold-war propaganda. When pressed to discuss the film, he strives valiantly to defend its makers while disassociating himself, to some extent, from their philosophies.

“The whole thing, I admit, is very naive. It is a naive film. There are cliches. It was clear from the beginning, even though the script that was first shown to me was different from what was eventually shot. Apparently that often happens. In any case, I accepted. Well, I said to myself, it is only a movie.

“You must remember, it isn’t my movie. It is Taylor Hackford’s movie. I am hired as an actor, that’s all. When you sign a contract, you give up certain powers.”

He tries to minimize the observation that many viewers will see the hero as a reflection of Baryshnikov’s own personality, history and feelings.

“Perhaps in a situation like this I have more responsibility than other actors might. I turned down so many other offers for similar reasons. But in this film, in this idea, I recognized a basic validity. I respected the people involved. One has to take certain chances.

“The components for something special were there. ‘White Nights’ isn’t really a fantasy. Essentially it could have happened. Planes get lost, shot down. The result is up to the director and writers. From the point when you are committed, you become their instrument.

“No matter how uncomfortable you feel, no matter how much you may disagree, there is little you can do once you have started. I spent 26 years in Russia. Obviously I cannot agree with certain things in the film. But it is not my film.

“I may not agree with certain political statements. I am not that right-wing myself. Still, I am right-wing enough to be in this country. I like a lot of things in this government, not everything. Who cares?

“I am not worried about any impression about me that the film will leave with the masses. If this had been a specific re-creation of my past, if my motives had been depicted, then it would have been different. This is Taylor’s impression of Russia. He has been there. This is the writers’ impression. At most, I could influence a few details.

“This is an honest interpretation of one point of view. It delivers one perspective of life in the Soviet Union. I was hired as an actor. My personal image is not big enough that people would associate me with the politics of the film.

“When Robert De Niro played ‘Taxi Driver,’ he didn’t say to the director, ‘Do it my way.’ I couldn’t say ‘Do it my way’ either.

“The film has problems, perhaps. I would be disappointed if anyone felt that the message was my responsibility. I don’t disagree with everything in that message. If I disagreed with everything, I wouldn’t have defected. I wouldn’t be here.”

“Whether one likes it or not, this is one of the few films that really opens the door a little bit. It shows how some people live over there, how the elite live, how the little people live. I had an even better apartment than the one shown in the film. People here don’t know that a KGB officer can be smart and educated, and that he can be a human being, too.

“The Russian people are very sensitive. The character of the old concierge in the apartment building--the woman who looks the other way so we can escape--she represents this great nation. The Helen Mirren character is very real and very complicated: a retired dancer--she could be Plisetskaya or Kolpakova--a strong person, a good person and yet a frightened civil servant with much to lose.

“The script may be very naive, but the ideas are valid. I am not trying to play politics. The basic theme, running away from the prison that is Russia, shows a right-wing attitude. The movie also tries to show how people live in society like that. It may be impossible to find the right balance, to show the ‘good America’ and the ‘good Russia.’ ”

The heat is rising. What about the scenes that show Gregory Hines hoofing his way through a Soviet distortion of “Porgy and Bess” in a Siberian barracks theater?

Baryshnikov offers a smirk and a bravura shrug of the shoulders. He rolls his eyes. He laughs.

And what about the intended grand-glitz finale, the ultimate production number that was never filmed, the back-in-the-good-old-U.S.-of-A. dance extravaganza for Baryshnikov and Hines that was supposed to send us all home humming and tapping and spinning and leaping and saluting?

The man called Mischa begins to respond with more laughter, more eye-rolling. Then he catches himself.

“If the film is good without it, we don’t need it,” he says. “If the film is bad, such a finale can’t save it.”

He is, if nothing else, a pragmatist.