Cast
Serge Lifar — Choreographer, ballet master, Principal dancer
Program notes
“For an entire generation... Lifar was like a god...” “...he was almost like a movie star. Any janitor in Paris could tell you about Serge Lifar!” Learn about one of the founding figures of contemporary ballet, brought to life in Florent Durth and Ivan Kuzmin’s fascinating documentary film from 2017!
Serge Lifar’s path to stardom is a true Cinderella story. After fleeing his native, war-torn Ukraine at the age of 17 to join Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes as a simple dancer, by the age of 25 he was already a choreographer and ballet master at the Paris Opéra. Serge Lifar fascinated the public and found himself at the crossroads of contemporary artistic creation, collaborating with Picasso, Bakst, Chanel, and Cocteau. His technique and his creativity revolutionized ballet and gave birth to a new “neo-classical” esthetic. Explore his life and work with his French biographers Jean-Pierre Pastori and Florence Poudru and the star dancers Charles Jude, Claude Bessy, Attilio Labis, Gilbert Meyer, and Cyril Atanassoff... all illustrated by never-before-seen archival footage and excerpts from his most beautiful works.
