The Bolshoi ballerinas maintained the classic style, which quite often was seen through their shorter, and more plump legs, while Elena Andrelenova was seen as an obvious foreigner since she was a modern style ballerina like those of today with a long and slender body (Andros, 1 B). During the performance, instead of the usual flowers thrown, a dead cat was thrown on stage, causing Elena Andrelenova to faint on the spot. .
The St. Petersburg school, under its French instructors, grew in fame and most notably produced Marius Petipa who would become widely known throughout Europe (Lawson 74). As Petipa's repertoire grew and his abilities became more known in Russia, he would send over-exaggerated accounts of his greatness as the "Soloist of the Tsar- to his brother in France, who then spread his fame throughout much of France, Italy, and other European countries (74). So when Petipa stepped out of Russia, he already had a well-known reputation as a dancer, thus preventing him from starting at the bottom as many of his fellow Russians were forced to in Europe. After years of traveling around Europe as a principal dancer, Petipa started choreographing his own productions, and created an even bigger name for himself around Europe. His choreography was very complex, and fitting for the time period of the late 1800's, but at the turn of the 20th century it seemed Marius Petipa was no longer a prominent figure in the European dance scene (76). The ballet schools felt that his work was now dull and soon grew tired of it, as well was a general consensus that Russian Ballet needed to be reinvented (Thinkquest, 1A). .
At the beginning of the 1900's it seemed that the Russians, who had been importing many of their dancers from France, had now surpassed the French Ballet and many Russian dancers had become international stars (1A). In fact, a large majority of the greatest dancers of the 20th century have been Russian, despite their late-beginnings (Parsons, 2).
