Walking the Line Between the Old and New Worlds

In Yuri Posokhov, San Francisco Ballet’s Ukrainian-born, Bolshoi-trained leading man, American dance seems to have its hands on that rare commodity, a true danseur noble. Refinement, nuanced attention to detail and an impeccable technique are the hallmarks of that elusive breed of male dancers--the princes of classical ballet.

Shortly after Posokhov’s arrival at the San Francisco Ballet in 1994, The Times’ Lewis Segal noted his “Bolshoi intensity along with the elegance and mastery of expressive detail honed during his seasons with the Royal Danish Ballet.” Allan Ulrich of the San Francisco Examiner calls him simply “the finest addition to the San Francisco Ballet’s male roster in years.”

Posokhov is expected to show off just that sort of class this week when he opens San Francisco Ballet’s five-performance run of “Swan Lake” as Prince Siegfried at the Orange County Performing Arts Center on Wednesday.

Much as he is identified with the storybook princes of ballets like “Swan Lake,” Posokhov can be quite impatient with what he considers outmoded interpretations of the classics. After all, he says, “the 19th century was 100 years ago.” Indeed, wanting to expand his artistic horizons has been a major theme of his life so far.

For starters, it has led him into exile. As a rising star at Moscow’s famed Bolshoi in the early ‘90s, he says, “I [had] wanted to find out about ballet in Europe and America, but I couldn’t; and the worst was that, even after the country opened up, they were not interested.”

Even so, when he was invited to join the Royal Danish Ballet in 1992, he hesitated. “I am Russian,” he says in halting English. “With all the problems, it still is our country and nothing else counts.”

Ultimately, however, he and his wife packed their bags and moved with their son to Copenhagen. “It was fate,” he says now, shrugging his shoulders during an in-between-rehearsals interview at San Francisco Ballet’s studios. “I am a person who believes in fate, in things just coming to you from the outside.”

In conversation, Posokhov, who is in his early 30s, is reticent, even melancholy. Slight but sturdy, with finely chiseled features, he seems to disappear into his sweats. He answers questions thoughtfully, appearing to rethink every role as he talks about it. “Dancing is very hard work, in the mind, not the body,” he has said.

In Denmark, Posokhov finally got the opportunity to test himself in newer works that had been denied to him in Russia. He danced, among other roles, Lensky in John Cranko’s “Onegin” and in works by John Neumeier and Roland Petit, choreographers rarely seen in America but best known for their highly theatrical, character-driven reinterpretations of the classics.

Posokhov explains why such approaches appeal to him: “I want to see the characters from the inside, find out about their motivation because it’s [all] there in the music.” He finds fault with American companies for their emphasis on the more abstract style of music visualization associated with George Balanchine and his followers.

“There is no tradition for theatrical ballet in America,” he says, “because, I understand, Balanchine came and developed ballet in America. But we need a balance. I like Balanchine, but”--putting his hands to his heart--”he has only one part of me.”

After two years in Denmark, Posokhov knew he needed to move on if he wanted to keep growing. When San Francisco Ballet’s artistic director Helgi Tomasson cast him as Prince Desire in his “Sleeping Beauty” for the Royal Danish and then invited him to San Francisco, Posokhov accepted. At SFB, he is particularly happy with Tomasson’s catholic view of what constitutes contemporary ballet.

“I like Helgi’s vision,” he says. “This company looks like no other company in America. It’s much more like a European company. He brings choreographers from all over the world.”

Still, in his first year with the San Francisco Ballet, he primarily danced traditional princes--in Tomasson’s “Sleeping Beauty,” “Romeo and Juliet” and “The Nutcracker” (the latter two in Southern California appearances). Then, in his second year, Posokhov stepped into less known, and from his perspective, more challenging territory. He was seen as Death in David Bintley’s AIDS ballet “The Dance House” (“I knew exactly what Bintley wanted, I could feel his vision even though I have never met him”); the professor in Fleming Flindt’s “The Lesson,” in which a ballet master kills his pupil (“The characters, the design, the music, everything fits together perfectly”); and Val Caniparoli’s African-inspired “Lambarena” (“Very light, a good presentation of American ballet today. It expresses lots of emotion in a very short period of time”).

And what of the San Francisco Ballet’s “Swan Lake,” a production that maintains a classic distance from Siegfried’s inner turmoil? Not surprisingly, Posokhov wants to plumb the depths of the prince who refuses responsibility and is easily seduced into betraying the woman he loves.

“There are two ways of looking at it. First, it’s a straightforward story about a prince and a swan. That’s naive. The second--and this is how I see it--it’s about life, about what we do, it’s about committing a sin. It’s all there in the music. But”--he interrupts himself--”I don’t want to talk about how I am going to do it, I will just have to express it.”

* “Swan Lake,” San Francisco Ballet, Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa, Wednesday at 8 p.m. Also Thursday-Friday, 8 p.m.; Saturday, 2 and 8 p.m. with different casts. $18-$59. (714) 740-7878.