Tiaras went flying and a date was set for a duel when Nijinsky's production of The Rite Of Spring went up in Paris, in 1913. But sex and death didn't shock the audience as much as feet turning in where they had always turned out, argues Michael Seaver as CoisCéim, the Dublin dance company, tackles the work

Causing a riot on opening night usually guarantees a reputation. When David Bolger, of CoisCéim Dance Theatre, premieres his Rite Of Spring at Project arts centre in Dublin tonight, it's unlikely that it will cause the same reaction as the first performance at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, in Paris, on May 29th, 1913. Igor Stravinsky's jagged and percussive score and Vaslav Nijinsky's cold and primitive choreography were giant leaps into the future, securing infamy by their ability to shock.

In his biography of Nijinsky, Richard Buckle picks up the action after the first act: "Between the two scenes the police were called in to seek out and eject the most violent troublemakers. But it was in vain. No sooner had the curtain risen on the trembling girls of Part II, their tilted heads propped on the back of their hands, than a voice called out, 'un docteur!', then another, 'un dentiste!', followed by another: 'deux dentistes!' There was laughter, shouting and whistling; and the battle was renewed.

"One smart lady in an orchestral box stood up and slapped the face of a man in the box next door, who was hissing. Her escort rose and cards were exchanged by the two men, who fought a duel the next day. Another society woman spat in the face of one of the demonstrators. Comtesse René de Pourtalès rose to her feet in her box, tiara askew, and cried out, brandishing her fan: 'I am 60 years old and this is the first time anyone has dared to make fun of me!' Composer Florent Schmitt shouted at the boxes: 'Taisez-vous, les garces du seizième!' "

A rough translation would be: "Shut up, you Dublin 4 bitches!". Ravel was called a dirty Jew and Nijinsky's mother fainted.

Reading more like a slapstick comedy than a pivotal moment in music and dance, the opening night sealed the fate for Nijinsky's choreography. While Stravinsky's score has become a classic, the ballet was dropped from the repertory of the Ballets Russes after only nine performances. Not only was the choreography lost; so, too, was an important battle for innovation within ballet.

Sergei Diaghilev, the impresario behind the Ballets Russes, was clearly delighted with the reaction. A believer in the adage that all publicity is good publicity, he was heard to comment after the performance: "Exactly as I wanted."

Others, such as Jean Cocteau, believed trouble was inevitable, as the well-heeled were mixed with the poets, artists and musicians who followed Diaghilev and his innovations. "Innumerable shades of snobbery, super-snobbery and inverted snobbery were represented," he wrote, "and the audience played the role that was written for it".

That the disturbances arose because of Nijinsky's choreographic language is important. This was no prudish reaction to nudity or indecency, but a response to a new choreographic vocabulary. Dancers turned in their feet instead of turning them out, stomped around the stage, trembling in asymmetrical groups, and rarely engaged with the audience.

As Nijinsky's choreography disappeared, Stravinsky's difficult score remained a challenge to choreographers. Léonide Massine was the first to choreograph another version of the score, seven years later, and although many leading 20th-century choreographers tackled it, most approached the score with trepidation.

"The score is such a challenge for choreographers, not just for counting, but because of the many layers and colours," says Bolger. Starting with an exploration of group behaviour at stag and hen parties, he became fascinated with the music and story of the original ballet.

Subtitled Scenes Of Pagan Russia In Two Parts, Nijinsky's ballet concerns the rituals of a prehistoric Slavic tribe as they leave the austerity of winter and move into spring. Part I includes ensemble dances by the young men and women of the tribe, including a mock abduction and Games of the Rival Tribes. A procession of elders is led by their sage, who kisses the earth, followed by a frenetic Dance of the Earth, which is danced by the whole tribe. In Part II, the tribe's maidens perform a circle dance, as one of them is to be chosen as a sacrifice to renew the fertility of the earth. The victim then dances herself to death while the tribe watches.

Although not slavishly following the original plot, Bolger admits its influence to the extent that the piece is now less concerned with stags and hens and more an exploration of ritual, birth and death.

Like many choreographers who approach the work, he acknowledges the shadow of Nijinsky, whose myth, even now, is as strong as ever. According to the dance critic Joan Acocella, "the appreciation of Nijinsky's choreography is an aesthetic matter. The appreciation of him, or of what he was said to be, is an emotional matter, connected with our fascination for sex, madness and transfiguration."

When Glen Tetley created his Rite Of Spring, in 1974, he danced as the sacrificial victim, which was an amalgam of both Nijinsky and the female chosen victim. The power of Nijinsky the dancer forced itself into the choreography. In some ways, this role mirrored Nijinsky's androgynous roles, created for him by Fokine. The Golden Slave in Scheherazade, the "poet" in Les Sylphides and the Spectre of the Rose: all brought him fame in the early years of the Ballets Russes.

Tetley's version gives rise to the question of whether Nijinsky could have danced the role himself. Marie Rambert, who was his assistant in 1913, describes how he would demonstrate to Maroussia Piltz, when creating the role of the Chosen One: "His movements were epic. They had an incredible power and force, and Piltz's repetition of them - which seemed to satisfy Nijinsky - seemed to me only a pale reflection of his intensity."

Many have gone further and speculated that the earth was sated with a male sacrifice; with Nijinsky dancing, The Rite Of Spring, or Le Sacre Du Printemps, could have lived to become Nijinsky's greatest creation.

When creating a new Rite Of Spring, many choreographers have abandoned the original form and stripped the choreography back to basics. Paul Taylor, in his 1980 version, sets up a double narrative of a rehearsal room where a Damon Runyon-like plot is acted out. A baby is kidnapped, then rescued by a jail-breaking private detective; in the end, the stage strewn with dead bodies, the Girl, who is the baby's mother, dances herself to death.

Stravinsky's score remains a potent force for choreographers. When Cathy O'Kennedy of FluxusDance was finding an ending for Súil Eile, a work concerned with pregnancy and birth, she chose the final Dance Sacrale from The Rite Of Spring. "It's visceral, cyclical and has a sense of inevitability about it that mirrored what I wanted to say about pregnancy," she says. "That final chord is such a release that signals both birth and death, a beginning and an end."

For Angelin Preljokaj, who choreographed the score last year, the music "carries a slowly rising force of desire and, at the same time, a kind of controlled panic, a madness at the thought of perpetrating an act that is dictated by the very molecules of our being".

In 1971, a Berkeley graduate named Millicent Hodson began to piece together Nijinsky's original choreography. For 16 years she sought out clues, photographs, sketches, scores and personal reminiscences. In 1981, she approached the Joffrey Ballet, in New York, and with Kenneth Archer, a historian whom she met during the research and later married, reconstructed the ballet, which was premiered in 1987.

Since the original production had just nine performances, they began the reconstruction by immersing themselves in the memoirs of the artists, to pick up clues. The importance of experiencing vicariously the hopes and expectations of the collaborators helped to identify the unique style of the ballet. Despite this, much hinged on the two piano scores belonging to Stravinsky and Rambert.

These were often contradictory, so it was decided that each would have priority in their own realms of expertise. Stravinsky, who sometimes played at the rehearsals, took priority on the general entrances and exits to music; Rambert, who knew every step of the dance, got the first say in any steps to music. Ironically, the bad reviews that described and denounced Nijinsky's "crimes against grace" turned out to be a rich source of material.

Although many are sceptical of the authenticity of the reconstruction, it gives us the closest possible experience of the original. But its re-emergence has done nothing to destroy the myth of Nijinsky's original and its capacity to influence and inspire.

The Rite Of Spring is at Project arts centre (1850-260027), Dublin, until February 2nd. It then tours to Siamsa Tíre, Tralee (February 6th); Black Box, Galway (February 9th); Garter Lane, Waterford (February 13th); An Grianán, Letterkenny (February 16th); Backstage Theatre, Longford (February 21st); Dunamaise Theatre, Portlaoise (February 23rd); and Draíocht, Blanchardstown, March 1st and 2nd

SPRING ROLES

Among those who, like Nijinsky and David Bolger have choreographed Le Sacre are:

Léonide Massine (1920)

Lester Horton (1937)

Mary Wigman (1957)

Maurice Béjart (1959)

Kenneth MacMillan (1962)

John Neumeier (1972)

Pina Bausch (1975)

Valery Panov (1977)

Richard Alston (1981)

Martha Graham (1984)

Mats Ek (1984)