CYGNET-TURE WORK : ‘Swan Lake’s’ Baby Steps Are Retraced in Costa Mesa by Britain’s Royal Ballet

Royal Ballet will whisk audiences back to 1895 when it unveils its production of “Swan Lake” on Tuesday at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa.

“I wanted to uncover a version as near the beginnings as I could possibly find,” says Anthony Dowell, artistic director of the Royal. “I am a great believer that in a work such as ‘Swan Lake,’ which has been around for a long time, the creators must have been pretty good at what they did when it was first done.”

“Swan Lake” premiered in 1877 in Moscow, but that production, with choreography by Julius Reisinger, did not survive very long and cannot be reconstructed. The version that has become standard is the 1895 St. Petersburg revival with choreography by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov. Over the years, however, this version has undergone changes, too.

So working with Tchaikovsky ballet scholar John Roland Wiley, Dowell went back to the dance notations for the 1895 revival. The Dowell-Wiley production premiered in Great Britain in 1987.

“I was very concerned that over the years, the Royal Ballet was left with an accumulation of all its previous productions,” Dowell said. “What bothered me most was that the musical line was, to put it crudely, butchered.”

Working with Wiley “put me on the right lines,” says Dowell. “I was never looking for putting my own imprint on it. I wanted the story line and the choreographic patterns to be as they were originally intended.”

In addition to “Swan Lake,” the Royal will be dancing a program of mixed repertory on Aug. 8 and 9. For this, Dowell picked Frederick Ashton’s “Scenes de Ballet,” Kenneth MacMillan’s “Winter Dreams” and David Bintley’s “ ‘Still Life’ at the Penguin Cafe.”

“I chose works by the bloodlines of our creative force, passing through the past to the future,” Dowell says. Ashton, who died in 1988, was the founding choreographer of the Royal. MacMillan, 71, is principal choreographer; Bintley, 34, is resident choreographer.

Ashton’s “Scenes de Ballet,” created in 1948, is an abstract divertissement set to a score by Stravinsky. MacMillan’s “Winter Dreams” (music by Tchaikovsky) is based on Chekhov’s “The Three Sisters.” Bintley’s “ ‘Still Life’ at the Penguin Cafe” (Simon Jeffes) is a morality tale populated with animal characters.

While works by Ashton and MacMillan are well known to Southland audiences, Bintley’s output is less familiar, although his “Sons of Horus” was danced by the San Francisco Ballet in Costa Mesa in 1989.

“David has quite a wide range,” says Dowell. “You won’t be seeing a classical ballet, although he’s using obviously classical steps in ‘Still Life.’ It’s an intriguing piece . . . fascinating, charming and amusing.”

What: Royal Ballet of Great Britain.

When: Tuesday, Aug. 6, through Aug. 11.

Where: Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa.

Whereabouts: San Diego (405) Freeway to Bristol Street exit. North to Town Center Drive. (Center is one block east of South Coast Plaza.)

Wherewithal: $20 to $65.

Where to call: (714) 556-2787.