Word: balieff
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...produced by Leon Greanin) stirred up memories rather than reactions. It evoked the gay Chauve-Souris revues of the '20s, when the Parade of the Wooden Soldiers seemed the most rollicking of tunes and Katinka the most "Rahsshan" of maidens, and the late Master of Ceremonies Nikita Balieff talked unbelievably dreadful English with unforgettably droll results. Katinka and the Wooden Soldiers are still on hand, but Balieff unhappily...
...agreeably, but never gets anywhere. It lacks everything exciting: the tune that can make a show, the performer that can stop one, the pace that can keep one spinning, the verve that can make one soar. As master of ceremonies, Producer Greanin has almost as heavy an accent as Balieff had, but he has not nearly so .light a touch...
...famed for damning the expense (he spent more than $600,000, most of it borrowed, producing The Miracle, went bankrupt when it folded in Dallas). At various times he represented Eleanora Duse, Geraldine Farrar, Mary Garden, brought to the U.S. for the first time the Diaghilev Ballet, Balieff's Chauve-Souris, the Moscow Art Theater...