Mathilde Kschessinska

Mathilda-Marie Feliksovna Kschessinskaya (Polish: Matylda Maria Krzesińska, Russian: Матильда Феликсовна Кшесинская; 31 August [O.S. 19 August] 1872 – 6 December 1971; also known as Princess Romanovskaya-Krasinskaya after her marriage) was a Polish ballerina from a family of Polish origin. Her father Feliks Krzesiński and her brother both danced in St. Petersburg. She was a mistress of the future Tsar Nicholas II of Russia prior to his marriage, and later the wife of his cousin Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich of Russia.

She was known in the West as Mathilde Kschessinska or Matilda Kshesinskaya.

Kschessinska was born at Ligovo, near Peterhof.Like all her Polish family, to whom she was known as Matylda Krzesińska, Mathilde performed at the Imperial Mariinsky Theatre of Saint Petersburg with the renowned Imperial Ballet. Kschessinskaya made her début in a pas de deux from La Fille Mal Gardée during a graduation performance in 1890 attended by Emperor Alexander III and the rest of the Imperial family, including the future Nicholas II. At the post-performance supper, the emperor sought out the young Kschessinskaya and told her to "...be the glory and adornment of our ballet."

In 1896, she obtained the rank of Prima ballerina of the Saint Petersburg Imperial Theatres. The old maestro Marius Petipa did not consent to Kschessinskaya receiving such a title and although she possessed an extraordinary gift as a dancer, she obtained it primarily via her influence at the Imperial Russian Court.

Petipa allowed Kschessinskaya to create only a small number of new roles, as he considered the Italian Pierina Legnani to be the superior ballerina. Although she was able to command top billing in theatre programmes or on posters, her efforts to obtain more new roles were thwarted by Petipa, whose authority over the artistic direction of the Imperial Ballet was not challenged even by the Emperor himself. Among the few roles Kschessinskaya created were Flora in Le Réveil de Flore (1894) and Columbine in Harlequinade (1900). She also became the first Russian danseuse to master the 32 fouettés en tournant of Legnani.

Although Petipa had a great respect for Kschessinskaya as a dancer, he thoroughly despised her as a person, referring to her in his diaries as " ... that nasty little swine." Even so, he chose her for the lead roles in many of the final revivals of his older masterworks, often devising intricate choreography for her to execute—the shade of Mlada in Mlada (1896), Queen Nisia in Le Roi Candaule (1897), the Goddess Thetis in Les Aventures de Pélée (1897), Aspicia in The Pharaoh's Daughter (1898), the title role in La Esmeralda (1899), and Nikiya in La Bayadère (1900). Such roles became notoriously difficult once Petipa revised them for Kschessinskaya.

In 1899, Prince Serge Wolkonsky became Director of the Imperial Theaters. Although he held the position only until 1902, he achieved a great deal. Sergei Diaghilev was his immediate assistant, and Wolkonsky entrusted him with the publication of the Annual of the Imperial Theaters in 1900. During this period, new names appeared in the theaters, such as painters Alexandre Benois, Konstantin Somov, and Léon Bakst. However, Wolkonsky was forced to send in his resignation after clashing with Kschessinskaya when she refused to wear the panniers of an 18th-century costume in the ballet La Camargo.

The future tsar

Kschessinskaya had been involved with the future Nicholas II from 1890, when he was a grand duke and she was just seventeen, having met him in the presence of his family after her graduation performance. The relationship continued for three years, until Nicholas married Princess Alix of Hesse-Darmstadt—the future Empress Alexandra Fyodorovna—in 1894, shortly after the death of his father, Tsar Alexander.

Two grand dukes

Scandals and rumours around her name developed and persisted as she engaged in a sexual relationship with two Grand Dukes of the Romanov family: Sergei Mikhailovich and his cousin Andrei Vladimirovich. In 1902, she gave birth to a son, Vladimir (known as "Vova"; 30 June 1902 – 23 April 1974); he was later titled H.S.H. Prince Romanovsky-Krasinsky, but said that he never knew for sure who his father was.

Coaching of Pavlova

While Kschessinska could be charming and kind to colleagues, such as the young Tamara Karsavina, she was not afraid to use her connections with the Tsar to strengthen her position in the Imperial Theatres. She was known to sew valuable jewels into her costumes and came on stage as the Princess Aspicia in The Pharaoh's Daughter wearing her diamond encrusted tiaras and chokers. She could also be ruthless with rivals. One of her most famous miscalculations occurred when, while pregnant in 1902, she coached Anna Pavlova in the role of Nikya in La Bayadère. She considered Pavlova to be technically weak and believed that the other ballerina could not upstage her. Instead, audiences became enthralled with the frail, long-limbed, ethereal-looking Pavlova, and a star was born.

Chickens on stage

Another notorious incident occurred in 1906 when Kschessinskaya's coveted role of Lise in the Petipa/Ivanov production of La Fille Mal Gardée was given to Olga Preobrajenska. One feature of this production was the use of live chickens on stage. Before Preobrajenska's variation in the Pas de ruban of the first act, Kschessinskaya opened the doors to the chickens' coops and, at the first note of the music, the chickens went flying about the stage. Nevertheless, Preobrajenska continued her variation to the end and received a storm of applause, much to Kschessinskaya's chagrin.

Through her aristocratic connections, she managed to amass much valuable property in the Russian capital. It was from the balcony of her elegant house that Vladimir Lenin addressed the revolutionary crowd when he returned from Switzerland in 1917.

After the Russian Revolution, Kschessinska moved first to the French Riviera and then to Paris, where she married, in 1921, one of the tsar's cousins, Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich of Russia, the possible father of her son Vova. Although Kschessinska's life in Paris was modest compared with the lavish life she had enjoyed in Russia, she lived on happily for over 50 years. In 1925, Mathilde converted from Catholicism to Russian Orthodoxy and took the name Maria. In 1929, she opened her own ballet school, where she taught such students as Dame Margot Fonteyn, Dame Alicia Markova, André Eglevsky, Tatiana Riabouchinska, Tamara Toumanova, Mona Inglesbyand Maurice Béjart. She performed for the last time at the age of 64, for a charity event with The Royal Ballet at Covent Garden.

In 1960, she published an autobiography entitled Souvenirs de la Kschessinska (published in English as Dancing in St. Petersburg: The Memoirs of Kschessinska). In later years, she suffered financial difficulties but remained indomitable. She died in Paris, eight months short of her 100th birthday. She is buried at the Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois Russian Cemetery.

• Fall of Eagles, 13-part television drama created by John Elliot for the BBC; portrayed by Jan Francis (1974).
• Anna Pavlova, film by Emil Loteanu; portrayed by Natalya Fateyeva (1983).
• Matilda, film by Aleksey Uchitel; portrayed by Michalina Olszańska (2017).
• Untitled Matilda Kshesinskaya project, written by Paul Schrader (TBA).

• H.S.H. The Princess Romanovsky-Krassinsky. Dancing in Petersburg — London, 1960, 1973.
• S.A.S. La Princesse Romanovsky-Krassinsky Souvenirs de la Kschessinska — Paris, 1960.