So it is, and to mark the 10th anniversary of the SAR’s return to China, the only ballet company with national accreditation will present not one but two productions over the course of a single week. On June 28 and 29, the company will perform Le Corsaire (The Pirate), a Western ballet first staged in 1826 for the Ballet of La Scala in Milan, and then on July 1, the visitors from Beijing dance The Red Detachment of Women, the Chinese ballet that premiered in 1964 and went on to be best known in the West for a performance before President Richard Nixon on his historic visit to China in 1972.

This choice of programming, bc learnt in an interview with Zhao Ruheng, Artistic Director of the National Ballet of China, was made by Hong Kong’s Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD). “We hope,” says the woman who has helmed the dance troupe since 1994, “that we can perform well and the audience will be pleased with our performances.”

At first glance, Le Corsaire and The Red Detachment of Women do not look like they have much in common. Le Corsaire was inspired by a poem by Britain’s Lord Byron, and is a fantastical ballet whose complicated, colourful (and admittedly frivolous) story revolves around the passions of a slave girl and a pirate in a Turkish bazaar, a pirate’s grotto and a Pasha’s palace. Much revised throughout its history, these days the ballet is performed chiefly in two versions: one favoured in Russia and other parts of Europe, and the other preferred in territories like the USA.

As befits the strong Russian influence on the ballet troupe from Beijing (whose first 10 years saw Russian ballet master Pytor Gusev and other teachers from the then USSR importing the training methods of the Russian Ballet School to China and also helping to stage several masterpieces of classical ballet), the National Ballet of China’s Le Corsaire will be based on the Russian version first staged by Marius Petipa back in 1858. This time, Moscow Theatre’s Marina Kondratieva is at the helm, although the ballet’s choreography remains credited to the influential Petipa, commonly known as the Father of Classical Ballet.

On the other hand, The Red Detachment of Women is a solidly Chinese creation as well as one of the signature works of this ballet company founded in 1959. The now 43-year-old ballet tells of a poor peasant girl who joins the Red Army and becomes a revolutionary heroine. It is set on Hainan Island, one of the company’s stops in its regular travels around China. In fact, Zhao says, the company visited the island both before the dance was composed to soak in and learn more about the local culture and then again after the ballet’s creation to “convey greetings” to the Red Army detachment based there.

As she notes, “The Red Detachment of Women is one of our significant dances and among our great successes.” Probably because, apart from the dancing, this particular ballet is such a dramatic experience. As Zhao says when asked what people new to ballet should look out for in The Red Detachment, “They cannot just emphasize the dance elements because the story line is important too.” And what will impress them in Le Corsaire? “Although the dance components are important, we cannot ignore the theatrical elements in Le Corsaire,” she says. Of course. Could we expect anything less than theatrical from a battle between slave traders and pirates over a beautiful girl?

The National Ballet of China will perform Le Corsaire on June 28 and 29 and The Red Detachment of Women on July 1 at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre’s Grand Theatre. Shows start at 7:30pm on all three nights. Tickets are $480 to $120 from URBTIX, 2734 9009.