Piano teacher Peter Ilych Tchaikovsky struggles against his latent homosexuality by getting married. Unfortunately he chooses nymphomaniac Antonina Milyukova, a depressed former student whom he cannot satisfy.
The compelling and bizarre story of Tchaikovsky's life and music. In Ken Russell's own words: "It's the story of the marriage between a homosexual and a nymphomaniac."—Jon Dakss <[email protected]>
Depressive, emotionally insecure piano teacher Peter Ilych Tchaikovsky tortuously struggles to have his music accepted and tries to suppress his homosexuality. The support of a wealthy widow as a patron gives him the artistic support he needs but his choice of a nymphomaniac as a wife proves disastrous.—[email protected]
In December 1875, Moscow Conservatory music teacher Peter Tchaikovsky (Richard Chamberlain) frolics at a snow festival in Moscow, and then passes out in bed with his gay lover, the foppish Count Anton Chiluvsky (Christopher Gable). The next day, Peter's brother Modeste (Kenneth Collen) arrives and warns him to protect his reputation or if news ever came out that Peter is a homosexual, the music Peter composes will never get played. Although colleagues gossip about Peter's relationship with his copyist Alexei (Bruce Robinson) and other male admirers, he retains the loyalty of Rubenstein, the head of the school.
During a preview in which he performs his new piano concerto at the conservatory, Peter captivates his audience with his artistry and musical ideas. Among the listeners are the enraptured student Nina Milyukova (Glenda Jackson) and the wealthy and reclusive, middle-aged widow Madame von Meck (Izabella Telezynska), neither of whom he has met; and his unusually close sister, Sasha Davidova (Sabina Maydelle). As Peter plays, he envisions an idyllic summertime with family and friends. Nina daydreams that a barouche ferries her and an army officer to their wedding. Sasha feels transported to a woods where she and Peter dance and kiss, until his attention is diverted by Anton, who, in the auditorium, meets Peter's eye as the piece closes.
Afterward, at the lively Rubenstein mansion where he resides, Peter inadvertently walks in on a woman singing in her bath. The sight of her recalls painful memories of how his mother died from the "hot bath cure" prescribed by her physicians for treating cholera. Reliving the trauma, he screams, frightening the woman and causing a scene, and later is consoled by Sasha.
Meanwhile, through Rubenstein, von Meck offers to provide Peter with an income and house, but stipulates that she does not wish to meet him in person. After Peter writes von Meck a beautiful letter of thanks, they commence an exchange of letters, sharing their ideas about music. While never meeting face-to-face, their relationship becomes emotionally satisfying for both of them and when Peter sends her copies of the music he has written, von Meck claims it is "real love."
Meanwhile, Nina writes love letters to Peter, in which she admires his music, and secretly describes fantasies in which he saves her from her abusive lover. Her letters resonate with Peter, who is working on his opera Eugene Onegin, in which a woman writes a letter to the hero. Claiming he wants to avoid the fate of the hero, who rejects the woman's love, Peter begins a hasty courtship and soon marries Nina in the spring of 1877 against the advice of everyone close to him. Warning that not all women are satisfied with spiritual relationships, Anton begs Peter to accept what he is. Upon hearing the news, Sasha cries, and von Meck, also upset, predicts that Nina will ruin Peter.
On their honeymoon in St. Petersburg, Peter is unable to make love to Nina, who agrees to be patient with him. Grateful, Peter tells her cryptically that there are things in his past she may not understand, but that he believes he can live a "normal, good life."
At an outdoor performance of Peter's ballet Swan Lake, Anton joins the couple, despite Peter's disapproval, and nudges Nina, who is ignorant of their past, into revealing her naïveté about Peter's life and music. After the performance, Peter dissuades Anton from remaining with them, but soon he and Nina are bored of walking and shopping, and begin to quarrel. When he suggests that they return to Moscow, she anticipates a romantic train ride in a private cabin, but instead, they get drunk and, to his horror, she tries aggressively to seduce him.
At home, Nina's constant presence annoys Peter and he confides in a letter to von Meck that "the only good part of him has perished forever." When Nina's conniving mother (Maureen Pryor) arrives unannounced, Nina tries to send her away, but Peter invites her to stay and offers to sleep on the couch, allowing the women to share the one bedroom. To von Meck, he claims that his marriage is a "dreary, unbearable comedy," but he cannot find fault with Nina, who loves him and yet is repulsive to him.
Confused by Peter's rejection, Nina fights her growing panic over losing her husband. Anton tries to ingratiate himself with them by taking Nina's mother to the opera, leaving Nina alone with Peter. Toasting their "sad, pathetic marriage," Peter asks forgiveness for marrying her, saying that she wanted a husband and he wanted marriage without a wife. Claiming that he cannot change and that everyone warned him against marrying her, Peter reminds Nina that Rubenstein tried to bribe her into quitting the marriage. Disturbed, she scratches at the floor with her hands as she talks and then, in desperation, tries to tear off their clothes and kiss Peter. In their struggle, she scratches Peter, who runs from the house to the cold river, where he attempts to drown himself, but refrains when a woman dressed in white walks by. When Peter returns home, he tries to choke Nina, but Alexei intervenes.
Later, Rubenstein tells von Meck that a doctor ordered Peter to spend time away from Nina. Von Meck, increasingly infatuated with Peter, offers to let him live in a lodge on one of her country estates. When Peter moves into the lodge, Modeste and Alexei accompany him, although Alexei is ashamed of Peter's treatment of Nina. Von Meck moves into the country manor on the estate but remains connected to Peter only through their letters, which become more passionate and, for von Meck, erotic.
Wanting to share more with Peter, yet maintain privacy, von Meck writes him to visit her house while she is away. Peter sits in her rooms, smokes and eats fresh fruit, and when she returns after he is gone, she eats from his leftover fruit and imagines she is lying chastely on a daybed beside him.
Still not comprehending Peter's sexual orientation and burdened by her mother's presence, Nina believes she can get her husband to return by making him jealous. Taking advantage of Nina's mental fragility, her mother procures men who pay to have sex with her daughter, introducing them as famous composers. Nina's sanity collapses into nymphomania and she becomes pregnant.
For Peter's birthday, von Meck throws an elaborate party in his honor in the gardens of the estate, and watches from a distance. Anton attends and tries to resume his relationship with Peter, but, deceiving himself, Peter claims he is "a respectable married man." Spurned by Peter, Anton has a private audience with von Meck. As Peter cavorts with young boys on the grounds below, von Meck becomes infuriated at the information Anton shares with her (implying that he tells her that Peter is homosexual).
When Nina's child dies at birth, Nina's mother sends for Sasha and, hoping to extract money from her, tells Sasha that her daughter needs special care. After seeing Nina, Sasha urges Peter not to abandon his wife and Peter claims he is helping financially as much as he can, but that he can never return to her.
Upon arriving at the lodge with his companions after visiting Sasha, Peter finds the grounds around the building on fire and discovers a letter from von Meck attached to the door, which is chained shut. In the letter Peter is told that his allowance has been stopped and the estate put up for sale.
At Modeste's suggestion, Peter begins conducting to earn a living and over the next few years becomes successful to earn his own house and wealth. Modeste and Alexei remain with him, but Sasha refuses to see him. In his loneliness, Peter tells himself that he really loved Nina. Although Nina's mother claims that her daughter is well cared for, she spends Nina's money on herself and places Nina in an asylum. There, Nina pretends that the inmates are her many lovers and that Peter loved her. However, even in dementia she realizes the truth and screams out, "He hated me!" thrashing about until the attendants restrain her.
Later in 1893, a cholera epidemic reminds Peter of his mother's death and Modeste suggests that the new symphony Peter has finished is so sad that it should be called "pathetic." As he and Modeste dine, Peter intentionally drinks water contaminated with cholera and becomes ill. In his consequent delirium, Peter cries that he tried to love Nina, but at last claims, "I cared for nobody." As a last resort, his doctor prescribes the hot water treatment that killed Peter's mother. After Peter dies from the treatment, Nina remains in the sanitarium, permanently imprisoned by her madness.
