Search - The Great Composers: Tchaikovsky on DVD

Beautiful and Entertaining

Jeffery Mingo | Homewood, IL USA | 07/24/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This was not a dry lecture with slides; it's a celebration of Tchaikovsky's work along with ballet performances. I really think that Tchaikovsky himself would have been honored by this tribute. You could tell the director, musicians, and ballet dancers recorded here also loved paying homage to this creative genius.

The first dance piece is a homoerotic performance. It occurs before the narrator even says "homosexuality." However, when the narrator begins by calling Tchaikovsky a sensitive boy who was devoted to his mother, he raises tropes of a feminine boy that some could read a certain way. I once read a book about Tchaikovsky that spoke more about gay life in Britain for Oscar Wilde than for Russia and Tchaikovsky's peers. By including a homoerotic performance, this film tries to picture what gay life would have been like for the composer. For those who don't support gay rights are ardently as I do (and think others should), please note that every other dance performance includes Tchaikovsky's dancing with women.

I read a book that said Tchaikovsky always referred to his sexuality with the letter Z (which is near the beginning of the Russian alphabet, not the end like in English), but that doesn't come up here. Another book said he may have had a romantic relationship with Camille Saint-Saens, but that is not brought up here either.

If you liked the art house film about Vaslav Najinsky that was released around 2000, then you'll like this even more so."