Cinderella reappeared on the Moscow stage early last week in a new version of the ballet with music by Sergei Prokofiev. Her metamorphosis took place on the small stage of the Maly Theater in a production choreographed by the Bolshoi's former chief choreographer, Vyacheslav Gordeyev.

Although it was part of the Bolshoi's repertoire for 45 years, it remains a ballet that Russian choreographers find difficult to realize using Prokofiev's score. Gordeyev decided to principally focus on the strictures of time and ignore the niceties of the famous story – pumpkin and mice, in particular. And instead of the prince trying to find a local girl whose foot fits the glass slipper, he is sent off to Spain, Egypt and Turkey in search of love, embodied by the mysterious and beautiful partner at the ball. Gordeyev, it should be said, comes up trumps in the Spanish scene. Superbly innovative and cleverly thought out, it introduces flamenco dancers within the framework of a bullfight, suggesting that Russians understand the enigma of Spain rather better than the Spanish themselves.

As the three-act ballet progresses, Gordeyev's ideas seem to come together and make greater sense than they did in the first act. For some reason, he began by not portraying Cinderella as a sad figure who is despised, neglected and abused by her step-sisters and step-mother, representing the vices of cruelty, indifference and vulgarity – as usual, roles comically performed by men. His heroine, danced by Anzhelika Tagirova, is a simple, kind-hearted girl who gains the respect of the Fairy Godmother (danced by Maya Dumchenko from St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Theater). The problem also is that Gordeyev clutters up the action, introducing innumerable extraneous characters, who neither accord with the ideas inherent in Prokofiev's music nor allow Cinderella the opportunity to express her feelings of rejection in a solo.

Her development as a character only begins once she appears at the ball, holding a mask and without demonstrating any pretensions to being a princess. When Time intervenes at midnight and the sinister Cavaliers of the Hours demand their hostage, she remains among the guests, once more in her plain gray dress but, to her bewilderment and distress, unrecognized by the prince – expertly danced by the Mariinsky's Yevgeny Ivanchenko.

Tagirova rises to the challenge in a role that calls for tender expressiveness in both the arm movements and arabesques, demonstrating that technique is merely a means to an end and not the end in itself. The final pas de deux, in which both she and Ivanchenko excel, ends with the lovers slowly whirling around as though caught in an eternal journey through space and time.

Given time, the production would undoubtedly benefit from readjustments and strengthening in character interpretations.