SPECIAL ISSUE - 6 INTERVIEWS by Andrej Koymasky (C) 2007 written on December 17th 1994 translated by the author English text kindly revised by John
USUAL DISCLAIMER
"SPECIAL ISSUE - 6 INTERVIEWS" is a gay story, with some parts containing graphic scenes of sex between males. So, if in your land, religion, family, opinion and so on this is not good for you, it will be better not to read this story. But if you really want, or because YOU don't care, or because you think you really want to read it, please be my welcomed guest.
FOURTH
Now we give you the interview of the handsomest, the most divine, who all of us have admired for years, and with whom many of us are in love, a real live myth, master of Art for generations of dancers and outstanding representative of the international gay intelligentsia.
ALEXANDR BUGALOF
Russian choreographer and dancer, U.S.A.
Q. It is a real thrill being able to interview the creator of the "Bugalof Ensemble", the first and only exclusively masculine corps de ballet and with a program of homoerotic dances. Do you know that I am your admirer for ever?
A. Thank you, you are really nice.
Q. First of all, Alex, I would like to ask you why, among male dancers, the number of gay dancers is so high.
A. Because it is important to the dancer to believe in the beauty of his body, and because this "tool" should be able to express all the emotions. It is a psychophysical exercise, extremely involved. The dancer has to love his own body, therefore we are often accused of being narcissistic. A dancer cannot but appreciate others who love his body. He has to believe in the sublime beauty of the male body, therefore he cannot but love another beautiful male body. The greatest dancers, history shows, are almost never heterosexual people. At least they are bisexual, more often they are gay. This admiration for the male body, moreover, starts with the first ballet lessons. Seeing the skill of the elders, of the master, one cannot help admiring, loving their bodies. And your model can only be someone of your same gender. And because dance is the expression of that reality that is the body-soul, you can only love them together, as in a unique reality... You want to know them with more intimacy and nothing allows you to really get to know a body-soul than physical, sexual intercourse. Did I answer to your question?
Q. Yes, certainly. Would you please tell me how you became aware that you are gay, and how did you accept it, how you lived and live in this dimension of yours?
A. Body and soul... I entered the classic ballet school when I was six years old. Mornings attending the elementary school, afternoons at the ballet school. I can assure you that, if you really want to become a dancer, you have no time for anything else. All your energies, all your thoughts, all your time is devoted to that. You have to care for your body, train, develop, harmonize it, you have to live in tight contact with it, having full awareness of it. And you have to learn from your elders. The admiration for the elders, for your master, comes out spontaneously. You entrust yourself to him, you let him mould you. You admire, imitate, emulate him. You want him to like you, you want his approval, his admiration. I grew up in this way. When twelve years old, I passed into the superior class, under a new master. It was a small trauma, but soon overcome. The new master seemed to me at once much better than the first one, more beautiful, more perfect... Admiration gave place to adoration. A smile from him was paradise, a scolding was hell. He was my, our, god. We let him completely mould us. I had his picture on my night table, do you know?
I was fourteen years old. After a lesson I found myself in the showers with him alone. At times it happened. I was admiring his body while he was washing himself. He was gorgeous! I liked seeing him nude, I liked looking at him, it gave me pleasurable sensations that I still was not able to define. He noticed my glances and smiled me.
"Are you looking at me?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because you are so beautiful!"
He again smiled and said: "You too are beautiful."
I blushed with pleasure and confounded said: "No, no..."
"On the contrary, you are growing up nicely, you have a really fine body..." he said and caressed me. I quivered. His hands seemed to really mould all my body. It was so a wonderful sensation. "Do you like it?" he asked me with a soft voice.
"Yes..."
"I too like it. I like you. You are so beautiful."
"Never as much as you..."
"Do you see what effect you have on me?" he said pointing at his erection. I looked at it in fascination - it was the first time I saw a virile member in its full splendor. "I desire you, Alexandr Mikolavich." he said with a low and warm voice.
"Yes, master..."
"I want to make love with you."
"Yes, master..." I repeated intoxicated.
"Let's dry up. Come to my room."
"Yes..."
I followed him and I felt like floating amongst the clouds. I felt so light, euphoric. My master "chose" me, amongst the many boys of our school. He lead me to his bed. He climbed on top of me. He loved me. He took me. It was incredibly beautiful. I had been able to give pleasure to my idol. When, later, he told me: "Will you come again with me, Alexandr?" I swore that I would run at his slightest sign. Later I became aware that I was not the only one he took his pleasure with. But he continued to want me too, and that was enough for me. Then I also started doing it with others of my companions, normally with my seniors that I most admired.
When I was sixteen, I gradually fell in love with Cyril, two years my senior. He was one of the best dancers of our school. Making love with him was something extremely cheerful and passionate. When he told me he wanted me to be his boyfriend, to be a steady couple, when he asked me to do it with him only, I accepted with joy. Therefore I told that to my master.
He seemed happy with my decision. "Cyril is a skilled dancer and a dear boy. You are right to become his boyfriend."
Cyril was passionate, strong, and sensual. While he was taking me, I was lost in his eyes which were two deep, blue lakes. I gave myself to him, every time he wanted me, with sheer joy, and it happened rather often.
When, seventeen, I entered in the corps de ballet where Cyril already was, we could also share our room. I adored Cyril and, seeing how he behaved with me, I thought that he also adored me. I was therefore happy, I felt realized. Also the quality of my dance improved dramatically, because now I was dancing for my Cyril. I wanted him to be proud of his boyfriend. Thanks to my relationship with Cyril I understood the importance of the sentiment in the dance. It is not only a question of technique, it should also be the expression of your soul, and the love, the passion and the desire are what help you to express yourself with your whole body, whether in the physical union or in the dance.
But unhappily I had a huge disappointment. We were together for two years when Cyril received a proposal to be hired at the Royal Ballet in London. He accepted, even knowing that this meant our parting. He made his choice and what he chose was not me. So, he left for London, leaving me.
What hurt me more was that he chose, he decided, without even consulting me. One day he simply told me the fact - "the day after tomorrow I leave for London. Good bye." So... If he had asked me, I would certainly have told him to accept, and I would have continued to love him. He could even possibly manage to take me to London too... we could meet again, even if seldom... So I didn't hate him - I simply erased him from my heart. But together with him I erased also the word "love".
Love doesn't exist, only physical pleasure exists. Therefore, the best is to look for it, to enjoy it when and where it is, without pretense, without lies, without binding oneself to anybody, without promises, without delusions.
We started our touring abroad. France, Italy, America, Hungary, Japan, South Africa, Australia, Canada, Germany... Two years of success. Two years of adventures. After Nikita asked for political asylum in the States, I became the first dancer of the corps. The first dancer in particular is courted by everybody. It was enough for me to like the physical aspect and I accepted all the proposals of my admirers. I gave myself to them without any problems. I accepted all the presents they gave to conquer me, with a smile. If I didn't like the guy, he could give me the moon and I would have refused both the man and the present. But if I liked him, I would have gone to his bed even without receiving a gift. Anyway I accepted their presents.
Waiters, industrialists, political men, policemen, cooks, students, reporters, hairdressers, financiers... white, yellow, red and black... but I never slept with my touring companions. It still hannted me, my experience with Cyril.
Q. Didn't you meet him any more?
A. Yes. When it happened to me, several years later, we greeted each other without problems, like two old friends.
Q. How long did your tour last?
A. Well, with many returns to Russia, it lasted for several years, as our corps became an itinerant corps. But when I was twenty I left the corps. I took this decision in New York. After the debut, when I went back to my dressing room, I found there a huge bunch of splendid white roses. There was a note. It was the gift of an admirer, a famous banker. He asked me if he could throw a party in my honor. I accepted. I met him before the party but I didn't expect to see before me a young man so decidedly beautiful. He was then thirty-three, with an athletic body, an open smile.
He started at once to court me. As I liked him, I didn't discourage him. The party started; in the elegant world of N.Y. I received several proposals, but I was waiting for his proposal. That came, two days later. With another huge bunch of white roses and a note that said more or less: "I can't sleep at night, I just think of you, I turn and toss in my empty bed. Help!"
This made me smile, I called him: "Message received. I want to help you... would you please send your driver to take me?" He was waiting for me in his huge round bed. We spent a crazy night. He seemed really a man mad with pleasure when, after long erotic games, I asked him to take me. He was really skilled...
Bryan, the third or fourth time we made love, told me he was in love with me. He wanted me to remain in N.Y. - he was ready to open my school of dance. I felt tempted. But I told him I was not in love with him, and that therefore I didn't feel like accepting his offer. He answered that he didn't care - he just wanted to have me near him, not to lose me. I told him that I really loved making love with him, but that I wanted to be free to do it with whoever I desired, and not just with him. He repeated that it was all right. I made a last condition that he accepted without any objection - I wanted to create a gay corps of ballet. So, at last I accepted. To leave my corps was not without difficulties, but Bryan, thanks to his high level contacts, smoothed the way easily.
Thus in N.Y. was opened the Ballet School Bugalof. It was a grand school. Bryan spared no expense. The first students arrived - from the boy novice who wanted to start, to the dancer who wanted improve himself. The school worked immediately at full rhythm. It turned out to be a very profitable investment and I soon was able to buy my own apartment...
Q. Were you not living with Bryan?
A. No, even if we met really often and also made love often. Bryan was not a possessive guy. It was enough for him that I look for him, to show him that I liked making love with him, and I really did like it. But I also started to take into my bed my students. Not everybody, of course, they were too many. I made my advances only to the most beautiful and skilled, and many of them accepted. So, little by little I created "my own" corps of ballet and the Bugalof Ensemble of N.Y. was born. It took me about six years before we made our debut in great style. But meanwhile, at times alone, at times with my best students, we participated in shows of higher and higher artistic level, in theaters or on the TV. TV in the States is a real power... and Bryan opened for us its doors.
Q. How long did your companionship with Bryan last?
A. On a physical level for three years. But on a friendship level and on a business level it never ceased. We are still very good friends, or rather, he is my best friend.
Q. For three years, therefore until you were twenty-three, right? What caused your sex relationship end?
A. Can't you guess it?
Q. Love?
A. You hit the bulls-eye! That love that I sternly kept out of the door, where I didn't want to fall, literally entered by the window. During a show, while I was on stage, the security service caught a seventeen years old boy, a Puerto Rican called Diego, who was rummaging in my changing room. He tried to flee but they blocked him right while the curtain was lowering. After the applause and the curtain calls, I went back to my dressing room and saw it was crowded with people. I asked what the hell was happening. I saw the boy and they explained to me. I asked them what he stole. They found on him only one of my pictures he took from the mirror and one of my shells, do you know those we put on our genitals under the leotard. This made me smile and made me curious. So I told the guards to leave him and to let us alone. While everybody was going out, I noticed on the table in front of the mirror a red rose with a note. I picked it up, surprised. The boy violently blushed and lowered his eyes. I read the note: "I would like making you mine. Diego".
I looked at him and asked: "Is Diego your name?"
"Yes, sir..." he said and blushed again to the tip of his ears.
"Sit down." I said. He sat. "So, you would like making me yours, eh? And why?" I asked amused by his embarrassment.
He looked straight into my eyes, a penetrating glance, strong, determined. Then he hastily said: "Because I am in love with you," and again lowered his eyes.
"You are in love with me?" I asked with an ironical tone.
He looked at me with a surprised, pained glance. But said nothing.
"So, you want to make me yours. But you are just a kid. How old are you?"
"Seventeen. But I am already a man." He proudly said.
"You slipped inside my changing room to steal. I can send you to the prison, don't you know?"
"No, just to leave the rose. But then I saw the picture, and the ball cup..."
"We call it shell." I corrected him laughing.
He continued: "They weren't meant to catch me, I had bad luck."
"But if you wanted to make me yours, how did you think to succeed without meeting me? Just leaving your message with your name, nothing more, without your address, telephone number, nothing?"
"I had a plan..."
"What plan?" I asked.
"I would have made you find more red roses with more messages, and after each show at the entrance I would have asked you your signature, until you noticed and recognized me. So then, I would have put there another red rose, but with my picture so that you could understand I am Diego and then... perhaps... if you too liked me... But at this point... You'll really call the police? You'll really report me?"
How tender he was!
"No." I said "Instead... do you feel like having supper with me, tonight?"
He looked at me with big wide eyes, then smiled and said, brightening up: "You really want me to eat supper with you, now?"
"Yes," I said, "I want to know you better..."
I told to the others waiting outside the door that everything was okay and took him with me to eat in a French restaurant. We talked for a long while. I could read in his eyes the intensity of his desire. From him was radiating a kind of force, of animal force. He made me think of a young bull in heat. I felt a shudder of pleasure. I felt it could be worth to try with him. So we went out and took a taxi.
"It's late. Do you want me to see you at your home, or would you rather come at my place?" I asked him.
"Nobody is waiting for me... If you really want to take me to your place... I would be enchanted..."
So we went to my home. We talked some more for a while. He told me about himself, without problems, about his life, poor but happy. About his discovery to be gay when he was just ten years old, when one of his uncles took him in his bed, and had sex with him. How, when he was thirteen, he convinced a school mate to let him fuck his ass, and after him, many more. How when sixteen he first saw my picture in a magazine and at once fell in love with me, and how after that day he never missed one of my shows.
"Are you ready to show me if you really are already a man as you said?" I suddenly asked him.
He again brightened up: "When you want, sir!"
So, I took him to my bedroom. He asked me if I'd let him undress me and asked me if I wanted to undress him... Naked at the side of my bed, he was enraptured. I saw he really was already a man. Between his legs a beautiful member of a good size, fiercely and proudly erect. Also his body was more mature than his age and his face could let foresee.
All but shyly, he pushed me on my bed, taking the initiative. He climbed on top of me, and started making love. He was a real force of nature. He brought me to a really strong state of excitement.
Then asked me with a sexy voice: "I can make you mine, can't I ?"
I nodded in assent, and he took me. He was much more virile than many adults who I made love with before. He made me moan and groan with pleasure.
"Te gusta? Te gusta?" he was asking in his language, looking at me full of happiness.
God, was he skilled! And he led me to the brim of orgasm, then let himself go, making it so that, as a real master, we both reached it at once.
I enjoyed it terribly. I told him so.
He, smiling, satisfied, simply said: "I was sure of it." It made me smile. He said: "Your smile enchants me. You are lot more beautiful than in all my dreams. I love you, Alex."
I made him stay to sleep with me. The following morning he woke me up starting again to make love... he was inexhaustible. I liked him really very much. He was handsome, simple, spontaneous, erotic... and with a pure heart.
I asked to meet him again. He came again, more and more often, and more and more often he stayed to sleep with me, until I asked him to stay with me, to come to live with me.
"Why?" he asked, but with a happy expression.
"Because I think I am falling in love with you."
"In this case, yes, all right. I move here."
He was working as a waiter in a hotel. He didn't want to leave his job, he didn't want my money, he wanted to use his own. He was a proud boy. He was also extremely jealous, even if he tried not to oppress me with his jealousy. Anyway I never gave him reason to be so - I liked him, he was enough for me.
After the three years we were together, I did my famous debut with my corps and the European tour. I persuaded him to resign from his job, to come with me. He was not really happy leaving his job, but he didn't want to be far from me either, so at the end he resigned.
Q. It was a really strong love...
A. Yes, and full of passion, at least as long as it lasted. We were together for five years. He was twenty-two years old. He fell in love with our custom designer, a French guy thirty years old. So one day he told me he had to leave me. I didn't suspect a thing of that, it was a blow.
"I am sorry to give you this pain, Alex. I fought not to fall in love with Marcel but one cannot lead his heart at will. I know we are doing you wrong, I beg you to forgive us..."
I was not even able to be angry with him... nor with Marcel either. But now they felt ill at ease - we were meeting almost every day. Thus, I lost at once my lover and my costume designer.
I plunged again completely into my job. My most beautiful creations are of this period. Not all of them, but many. And I started again making love with my dancers and with my admirers. More and more determined not to fall again in the traps of love.
Q. But, from what I know, you didn't succeed...
A. No. As Diego said, "you cannot lead your heart at will".
Q. Did you meet Diego again?
A. Yes, just once. I stopped at a small hotel in a village - I was tired and needed some rest. The hotel owners were Marcel and Diego. They seemed happy. In the hall there was a very big picture of me - this surprised and pleased me.
Q. And how did it happen that you fell in love again?
A. I was thirty years old. A magazine decided to devote to me and to my ballet a special issue. Thus, interviews, pictures...
Q. Is not this the magazine you are talking about?
A. How could you get this issue of the magazine?
Q. I am your admirer. This issue is a real treasure for those who admire you. These are the most beautiful pictures I've ever seen of you.
A. That's right. The photographer was a twenty year old boy, his name is Ferguson Halley. Gus to his friends...
Q. He is your Gus, your actual partner, isn't he?
A. Exactly him. And I believe that these pictures are so beautiful because Gus was falling in love with me.
Q. Were you aware of that at once?
A. No, not at all, only gradually. One day I was posing for him for some nudes... these, you see...
Q. Very beautiful ones...
A. Yes... he told me it was hard to continue shooting, that day. I asked him if he was tired.
"No," he said, "the problem is that I am too aroused."
The way he said it, his glance, I don't know, the fact is that I got a hard-on... he shot more pictures.
"You are not going to publish them, are you?" I asked somewhat alarmed but also a little amused.
"No, I will keep them for myself... for my lonely nights." He said with a sweet smile.
I laughed, and without a second thought, I took his hands off the camera and started to undress him. We made love. He was extremely sweet, so different from Diego, but not less pleasurable.
When he left, much later, I had the clear feeling I was starting to fall in love with him. I didn't want that. Therefore on the following day, when he came again (I noticed he spruced up for me) I told him I didn't want to have any more sex with him. He was disappointed, he was so sure it would be to the contrary. He asked me why. I did the foolish (or the wise?) thing to tell him the reason - I didn't want fall in love any more, and I was afraid it could happen with him. Therefore, in the most absolute way, no more sex between us!
He tried to convince me, to reason, he begged... I was inflexible. The picture sessions came to an end. I thought I had solved the problem. I was quite mistaken. He started to call me - he knew when I was not home and there was the answer machine. When I got back, every day, I found his message: "Alex, Gus here. I love you!" Just those words.
I received love cards, I don't know where he found them, one every day and always different, of various styles, with his signature inside a heart, nothing more. Then, after a few months, I wrote him imploring him to stop it. Suddenly calls and cards stopped (anyway I had received as much as a hundred and forty seven cards!)
I felt relieved but, I must confess, also a kind of disappointment. He yielded so easily... But it lasted briefly. One day, leaving home, I found the neighborhood was plastered with white posters with a big red heart in the center and the words: "Gus loves A. B." and under it, smaller: "sooner or later you'll surrender. Gus." The posters had all their official city authorization mark. He must have spent lot of money.
I was annoyed but amused at the same time. Gradually the posters disappeared, covered by other posters. But one day, going back home, I found my door literally covered by a forest of red and white roses making a huge heart...
Q. It seems that white and red roses mark your life...
A. Yes, you are right. I took them away, but I kept two of them, one of each color, in a book... I feel tenderness for Gus, but am always determined to resist his courting. Certainly I cannot help but recall the only time we made love and this thought is more than agreeable.
My Ensemble performed a new show - on all the playbills, all over the city, a white strip is glued with printed in red: "Gus loves Alex". The reporters ask me about it, the media talk about it. This time I am really annoyed. I ask my lawyer to send him an injunction. He answers with a heart-felt letter: "If you succeed in sending me to prison, it could not be worse than now. I love you, I absolutely cannot renounce you. Gus."
I don't know what to do. Then, the last straw that broke the camel's back. Gus tells the reporters he is the guy who paid an agency to put those stickers on my playbills. TV, radio, newspapers interviewed him. He declares he can't help it, he is in love with me and even if I refuse him, he can't yield. When one is in love, all the rest has no importance, he declares.
I am furious. He can't make public such things! I go to see him, to face him. I ring at his door.
He sees my angered expression and says, with a subdued, sweet tone: "Forgive me Alex, but I really love you, I'm madly in with love you."
"It is real madness, all this!" I reply deeply annoyed.
"I know, but I can't help it."
"Stop it, please!" I say with a stern voice.
"I can't. There is already another love declaration in progress for tomorrow..."
"Oh my god, what is it this time?" I ask in alarm.
"I would have stopped you tomorrow morning by telephone - at noon a plane will pass over your house and will write with the smoke that I love you..."
"Stop it. Cancel it."
"I can't, I've already paid."
"I'll give you back your money. Tell them not to do it..."
"It is not a problem of money..."
"Tell me what I have to do to stop you..."
"Make love with me..." he almost whispers.
All this discussion happens on the landing of his apartment staircase, aloud. So, in a while, all the neighbors are there, drawn by the tone of my voice. And they look at us, listen to us in silence. At this point I don't care any more.
"Gus..." I start belligerently.
I realize that in his eyes a tear is shining, flickering, even if he still smiles. I understand he is fighting not to burst in tears. I feel upset, troubled. Something breaks inside me, in my determination. We look at each other for a long while without uttering a single word. And inside me a voice tells me: 'you love him, don't deny the evidence. He is a special boy, and he loves you... and you too love him or else you would not have kept his cards, the two roses... Why are you trying to still resist him, why are you giving him such pain? He needs you, but you need him too. You cannot continue to be a loner, having a different partner each day. Accept his love, give him yours...'
"Give me the address of the plane's Agency." I ask him. He looks at me and shakes his head. "I want that address immediately, or else you will never again see me. I swear."
"What will change... either way?" he sadly asks.
"Gus, for the last time... I'm asking this as a kindness, if you really love me, show it to me in this way - give me that address..." I say with a gentle tone. I hit the mark.
Tears now drip on his cheeks, but he says: "All right, wait a moment..." he goes in, comes out soon and hands me a slip of paper: "You have just to tell them this code number... they will do what you ask them..."
"Thank you Gus. I have another thing to ask you. Remain at home tomorrow, all day long. Don't go out for any reason."
"I don't understand..."
"I'm sending my lawyers, I want them to find you."
"It's of no use..."
"On the contrary, it is. Promise me you'll be home, tomorrow."
"As you want."
"Thank you, Gus. See you."
"Good bye."
I destroyed him... I go back home. I call the plane's Agency. The following day, at 11:30 a.m., I am at Gus' house.
I wait a while then, at 11:50 I phone him: "It's Alex. In five minutes open your window and look out."
"I don't understand..." he says but I hang the receiver.
I see him. I slip inside his front door and climb to his floor, in front of his apartment door. I look at my watch. I hear the plane noise - I know it is writing on the sky with the smoke: "Gus, go and open your door." Will he understand?
Yes, he understood. He opens and he is in front of me, radiant. He throws himself in my arms and cries like a child. I take him inside, kiss him. He squeezes against me.
"Alex..."
"Yes, Gus, you won. I want to be yours... forever."
So, finally we became lovers.
Q. Thank you Alex, for your fascinating story. I know you are now planning a great show for the tenth anniversary of your Ensemble. What is it about?
A. Gus's courting story... a little changed of course, we cannot have a plane flying on the stage, you see... I hope you will come to see it in a great number. It will be a big show, we put in it the best of our experience of ten years.
Q. Who will interpret your part and that of Gus?
A. My first dancer and, of course, his boyfriend.
"Q. Good. I'll not miss it. Many greetings and congratulations, and thank you again for the wonderful ballets you continue to produce and plan. I am certain you really are writing a chapter of the gay culture of our city and of the world.
CONTINUES IN CHAPTER 5
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