Ballets Russes on Film! Lydia Loupokova, Stanislas Idzikowski, ’Le Carnaval’ (1916)

A while back, I was looking at a compilation of early French newsreel footage titled ‘Le Music-Hall Français: La Belle Otéro, Jane Marnac, Mistinguett with Chevalier and Mayol, 1913’. About a third of the way through, there was film of what is described by the voiceover as dancers preparing for “Nouvelle Saison des Ballets Russes de Serge Diaghilev” - the costumes worn by the ballerina and male dancer were those of Columbine and Harlequin in ‘Le Carnaval’. A little later I found a clearer copy of this same footage. The question then was ‘Who are these dancers?’. But first some background to the ballet. Richard Buckle in the almost standard work ‘Nijinsky’ (Simon and Schuster, NY. 1971) states () that Mikhail Fokine was asked on 20 February 1910 to create a ballet for a charity ball in the Pavlovsk (Pavlov Hall), Saint-Petersburg. Mikhail Kornfeld, the editor of the magazine ‘Satyricon’, which was sponsoring the ball, and the poet Paval Patiomkin made the proposal. ‘Carnaval’ was choreographed to mus