AS she winds up a nearly 30-year career — 16 years of it with American Ballet Theatre — Nina Ananiashvili no longer dances Giselle, but rather the idea of Giselle. Or so it seemed Monday night at the Met.
“Giselle” is the story of a young village girl who dies after being deceived by the two-timing nobleman Albrecht, yet forgives and redeems him from beyond the grave.
Ananiashvili’s Giselle, with rag-doll arms and fey poses, was as stylized as Kabuki. She’s not a method actress. She boiled up her mad scene in a matter of seconds; it took a leap of faith to go along with her.
You end up believing in her as a ballerina more than as Giselle; ripping through a quick circle of turns, she took her roars of applause even before they came.
Her Albrecht, Marcelo Gomes, was her opposite, as flesh-and-blood as she was stylized. He almost stole the show through his commitment to both the story and his Giselle. Gomes threw himself into his dancing, yet was unafraid to lay on her grave and weep.
As queen of the ghostly Wilis, whose ranks Giselle nearly joins after death, Gillian Murphy had fiery red hair and a fierce technique. The “Peasant” pas de deux in Act I didn’t go as well; Maria Riccetto was bloodless and Jared Matthews labored.
ABT’s artistic director, Kevin McKenzie, tells the story straightforwardly, since nothing works better to sell this evocative but weird 19th-century tale than believing in it. Who doesn’t get shivers when the Wilis, arrayed in ghostly lines, cross the stage as the music swells?
Ananiashvili will give her final ABT performance June 27 in “Swan Lake.” She and Gomes dance again tomorrow.
GISELLE
American Ballet Theatre
Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center; 212-362-6000