The Firebird the New York City Ballet in 1949 with Maria Tallchief as the Firebird, with scenery and costumes by Marc Chagall, and was kept in the repertory until 1965. The ballet was restaged by George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins in 1970 for the New York City Ballet with elaborated scenery by Chagall, and with new costumes by Karinska based on Chagall's for the 1972 Stravinsky Festival that introduced Gelsey Kirkland as the Firebird. In 1970 Maurice Béjart staged his own version in which the ballet's protagonist was a young man who rose from the ranks of the revolutionists and became their
The Rite of Spring critical triumph. It has remained in the company's repertoire for more than 50 years; after its revival in May 2011 "The Daily Telegraph"s critic Mark Monahan called it one of the Royal Ballet's greatest achievements. Moscow first saw "The Rite" in 1965, in a version choreographed for the Bolshoi Ballet by Natalia Kasatkina and Vladimir Vasiliev. This production was shown in Leningrad four years later, at the Maly Opera Theatre, and introduced a storyline that provided the Chosen One with a lover who wreaks vengeance on the elders after the sacrifice. Johnson describes the production as "a product of state