When Natalia Osipova started rehearsals for her first ever play, it didn\u2019t go well. \u201cI cry. I\u2019m shaking. I\u2019m stressed and completely lost on the first day,\u201d she reports. \u201cI think, \u2018I\u2019m a piece of shit!\u2019 I want to take a taxi and run away.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the second week of rehearsals when we meet, and Osipova is still here. The Royal Ballet principal plays a Russian ballerina from a previous age: Lydia Lopokova<\/a>, who danced with Diaghilev\u2019s Ballets Russes, then in 1925 unexpectedly married British economist John Maynard Keynes, who is the protagonist of James Graham\u2019s The Standard of Living \u2013 a play about, among other things, taking risks and imagining a brave new future.<\/p>\n Acting is central to ballet\u2019s appeal for Osipova. \u201cMaybe I\u2019ll never be super perfect for classical ballet because I love stories so much,\u201d she says. Even so, she demurred when former colleague Edward Watson suggested she audition. \u201cYou\u2019re stupid!\u201d was his retort. \u201cYou need to try because it\u2019s amazing opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2018She for him and he for her\u2019 \u2026 Osipova with Pip Carter and Rory Kinnear in rehearsals for The Standard of Living. Photograph: Manuel Harlan<\/p>\n A delicate silver necklace shines beneath frank brown eyes. Osipova requested a translator in our previous interviews, but today speaks in an idiosyncratic gallop not unlike Lopokova\u2019s own. Entering Nicholas Hytner\u2019s rehearsal room, joining a classy cast led by Rory Kinnear<\/a>, she felt like Lydia among Keynes\u2019s sneery Bloomsbury friends. \u201cI left rehearsal and cried,\u201d she says, \u201cbecause I feel, \u2018Oh my god, I\u2019m so bad.\u2019 But you learn and listen and every day, step by step, I do better.\u201d<\/p>\n double quotation markRussia is my home, my family, my theatre, my friends. It\u2019s my everything<\/p>\n Working with text for the first time, especially in her second language, is, she confirms, \u201ca whole new world\u201d. She drafted in her husband, dancer Jason Kittelberger, to run through lines at midnight. \u201cDance is my world,\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019ve danced since 17, I\u2019m 40 now. It\u2019s my life.\u201d But gradually, she found that the fundamental goal in theatre was the same. \u201cYou\u2019re learning your material, you try to understand what\u2019s important. With your partner, you start to play. You listen, you reply, and this is like life.\u201d<\/p>\n Graham is also in rehearsal, continually adjusting the script. His play is attentive to Lydia\u2019s physicality: dance solos mark the scene changes, while a frequent stage direction for Lydia is \u201cshe stomps\u201d. Osipova delights in making him laugh \u2013 they have just rehearsed Lydia\u2019s first entrance, swearing fearsomely in Russian \u2013 and she feels kinship with her character.<\/p>\n Photograph: Linda Nylind\/The Guardian<\/p>\n Lopokova, says Osipova, \u201cis not famous and popular in Russia\u201d \u2013 her choreographer brother, Fedor Lopukhov<\/a>, is better remembered. \u201cShe was two years in the Mariinsky, and after migrating with Diaghilev for his Russian season, she didn\u2019t really come back.\u201d<\/p>\n She was reportedly strong in drama, irresistible in comedy. \u201cShe had a beautiful, huge jump,\u201d Osipova says. \u201cThat I have too!\u201d Keynes was her second husband and, to everyone\u2019s surprise, the real thing. Each altered key parts of their identities: Maynard as a man who slept with men (keeping meticulous records of his encounters), Lydia as a feted dancer. \u201cShe changed her life to be with him,\u201d Osipova says.<\/p>\n She describes Keynes as \u201ca man like a mountain, to hug her and give her everything. She for him and he for her.\u201d Keynes\u2019s Bloomsbury chums were less appreciative. \u201cShe was a clever woman with ambition,\u201d Osipova argues, bridling at their jeers. In the play, she is called \u201cthat flat-footed, frivolous foghorn of a chorus girl!\u201d Osipova grimaces. \u201cI\u2019m always upset when I hear somebody say that about dancers. It gives me pain because I feel dancers have such a special soul. It\u2019s a different brain.\u201d<\/p>\n