Russians Cheer Return of Legendary Ballerina

For a few minutes Sunday evening, some of Russia’s leaders let their passion for ballet vanquish their passion for politics.

Dance legend Maya Plisetskaya, born in 1926 and long the prima ballerina of Moscow’s most famous stage, returned to the Bolshoi Theater where she first danced half a century ago.

“There is a sensation in Moscow: Plisetskaya is back on the Bolshoi stage after a long break,” Russian TV news reported happily.

Two years ago, she danced a single selection in the house she helped make famous.

On Sunday evening, Plisetskaya entered the downtown theater to a thunderous ovation. To an accompaniment by emigre cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich, she interpreted Camille Saint-Saens’ graceful and lyrical melody “The Swan”--the same piece she danced two years earlier.

But this time, the ballerina also performed selections from the ballet “Isadora” and other works, including a piece choreographed to the music of her husband, composer Rodion Shchedron, who attended the performance.

Russian TV said it was no coincidence that in Russia’s troubled times--when Muscovites now must hurry to get home before curfew--Plisetskaya had returned “just to be here.”

Plisetskaya, who has recently spent substantial time working in France and Spain, has reportedly settled with her husband near Vilnius, Lithuania.

Her audience included the country’s three first deputy prime ministers--Yegor T. Gaidar, Vladimir F. Shumeiko and Oleg N. Soskovets--St. Petersburg Mayor Anatoly A. Sobchak and President Boris N. Yeltsin’s chief of staff, Sergei A. Filatov.