reconstructing Nijinska's 1920s choreographies at Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. Yet for Nijinska then in 1938, in pre-invasion Poland, the going became more difficult. The "shock of her dismissal" and "the impending war caused a profound depression." Ballet companies and exemplary ballets 1939–1950s Nijinska and her family were in London when World War II started with the combined Nazi and Soviet invasion of Poland (September 1939). She had a contract to "co-direct the dance sequences on a new film, Bullet in the Ballet," but it was cancelled due to war. Fortunately, an offer from promoter de Basil allowed them to make their way back to the United States. She eventually established a new residence in Los Angeles. 'Ballet Theatre' in New York: La Fille Mal Gardée of Dauberval Nijinska in 1939 began to choreograph a "rustic and comic" two-act ballet of the 18th century, Jean Dauberval's La fille mal gardée ['The ill-watched Daughter' or 'Useless Precautions']. For the inaugural season of Ballet Theatre (now ABT), it opened in January 1940 in New York City at the old Center Theatre in Rockefeller Plaza. La Fille Mal Gardée is perhaps "the oldest ballet in the contemporary repertory" whose "comic situations are no doubt responsible for its survival." Jean Dauberval wrote the libretto and first choreography, the original music being a mix of popular French songs. Premiering at Grand Théâtre de Bordeaux in 1789, the comedy "quickly made the circuit of European stages." Later in 1864 Taglioni's production in Berlin first adopted composite music scored by Hertel, which in 1885 was adopted by Petipa and Ivanov for the Maryinski Theater in Saint Petersburg. Dauberval's plot follows a lively rural romance, the lovers being "the mind-of-her-own Lise and the hard-to-resist Colas". They are challenged by Lise's mother the widow Simone, who prefers Allain, a wealthy but dull suitor. "In America the most important production was Nijinska's for Ballet Theatre in 1940." Lucia Chase had invited her to mount her own version, which incorporated decor from Mordkin (his company had merged with Ballet Theatre). Nijinska took to revising Petipa's Russian version of La Fille Mal Gardée and staged the ballet with Irina Baronova and Dimitri Romanoff. This 1940 staging was soon revived, once as The Wayward Daughter, with later versions by Romanoff, and in 1946 by Alexandra Balashova. Eventually it entered the repertory of the Grand Ballet du Marquis de Cuevas. Twenty years later in London, Nijinska's