production and deciphered them to bring the ballet back to life. It has since become a regular part of the Bolshoi's repertory. It was also a production of the choreographic trend parallel to that of the grand opera in music, towards the ballet à grand spectacle, which lasted four hours and used different styles and techniques and a large number of people (about 400), with plots characterized by strong dramatic contrasts. Marius Petipa changed the art of classical ballet by inserting divertissements, or displays of dance that were perhaps symbolic or loose importance to the story, as a display for dancers that were not the leads. This was important because, at the time, many foreign guest artists were being brought in and the Russian-trained, Russian-dancers were not being given the chance to display their own talents. Marius Petipa started putting these divertissements in all of his ballets (Swan Lake, La Bayadère, The Sleeping Beauty, etc.) and the divertissement itself became a technique used by many choreographers as a way to give dancers time to change costumes, shoes, or create a scene break. The interest in Ancient Egypt at the time, inspired by recent archaeological finds, as well as Gautier's Le Roman de la momie, gave Petipa the push to create The Pharaoh's Daughter. These interests and finds inspired a new wave of costuming, such as the newly shortened tutu being decorated with Egyptian jewelry and ornamentation. These decorations were meant to give the audience a better feel to the ballet and reflect Egyptian nationality. Some of these costumes could be considered racist, as the leads were dressed in beautiful, expensive costumes, where the Nationalistic dances could be covered in blackface. They were meant to inspire a feeling of Egyptian taste, but authenticity was often compromised for opulence and could be considered entirely offensive. The ballet's literary source is Le Roman de la momie by Théophile Gautier, the exponent of literary exoticism which offered all sorts of romantic expedients: the passionate love story of the great Pharaoh's daughter and Tahoser set in a Biblical Egypt which, however, disappeared in the ballet, and the Gothic taste for gloomy corridors and dark tombs. What the ballet retains of Gautier's world is the sense of the fantastic which accompanies the most earthly passions. A fragment of the past or a puff of opium – a familiar influence in the works and lives of contemporary