Internationally renowned ballerina Svetlana Zakharova – the Bolshoi’s prima and the Etoile at Teatro alla Scala – returns to Dubai Opera on 8 March 2026 with a one-night performance only – MODANSE, a double bill produced by MuzArts. 

A towering figure in the 21st century ballet will be joined onstage by a star-studded cast of dancers from the Bolshoi Theatre. 

The night will open with a ballet Come Un Respiro (Like a Breath) by Italian choreographer Mauro Bigonzetti created specifically for Svetlana Zakharova. The musical basis of the performance was formed by various pieces by George Frideric Handel. Incidentally, the Baroque period is present not only in the music, but also in dance choreography emphasized by stylish and daring costumes designed exclusively for the ballet by Helena de Medeiros. 

The second part of the performance will feature a tribute to the legend of fashion Mademoiselle Coco Chanel. Ballet Gabrielle Chanel is the collaboration by choreographer Yury Possokhov and composer Ilya Demutsky with Alexei Frandetti who created the libretto and acted as director. 

CHANEL Fashion House studio headed by Artistic Director Virginie Viard has created more than 80 costumes specifically for Gabrielle Chanel ballet. 

The performance narrates Chanel’s journey that has forever overturned the world of the 20th century fashion – from an obscure provincial singer to head of one of the most influential Fashion Houses.  Chanel was inspired by dance, as movement and a metaphor of freedom, as a language and an expression of beauty.

The plot is based on the life story of Coco from the moment she worked in a cafe (the libretto was written by Alexei Frandetti, Golden Mask laureate). But the performance does not begin with this: Svetlana Zakharova in a white suit and hat sits in a chair on the front of the stage, takes a few spectacular steps and comes close to the black curtain onto which Gabrielle's images are projected. The action is accompanied by very cinematic music by the young composer Ilya Demutsky (performed by the Bolshoi Orchestra conducted by Pavel Klinichev).

There is practically no scenery in the play, instead of them there are a dozen screens where chronicles and photographs are shown. In about an hour, the biography of the fashion designer is consistently (but briefly) retold: a meeting with Etienne Balsan (Mikhail Lobukhin), who persuaded Coco to become a designer; an affair with oligarch Arthur Capel (Jacopo Tissi) and his death in a car accident; atelier opening; work on images for the ballets of Russian Seasons. Particular attention was paid to this period: choreographer Yuri Posokhov added fragments from the productions of Apollo Musaget by Balanchine and Blue Express by Nizhinsky. Naturally, the costumes are copied by those that Coco came up with, and for the premiere in the Bolshoi they (like everyone else in this production) developed the CHANEL fashion house. As if a hint on the screens appears a portrait of the composer Stravinsky, a novel with which they attribute Chanel.

The performance seems fractional: fragments are separated from each other by Coco quotes, which are read by a female voice, because of these pauses the action is greatly inhibited. In general, the biopic-ballet turned out to be visually beautiful and stylish (some changes of Zakharova’s costumes are worth it), but it is difficult to call it exciting.