Bolshoi may miss 2008 overhaul deadline

By Olesya Dmitracova

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Moscow's Bolshoi Theatre may not be able to reopen in 2008 as planned because its renovation has been mired in unexpected problems and expense, the state agency paying for the works said on Tuesday.

In July 2005 the Bolshoi, one of the world's leading opera and ballet companies, closed for restoration, its facade tarnished and walls and columns pitted by decades of neglect.

"There may be a change in the date of the end of the reconstruction," Natalia Uvarova, a spokeswoman for Russia's Federal Culture and Cinematography Agency, told Reuters.

Uvarova said the building was still being examined and renovators were expected to provide a more precise completion date by the end of August.

"When the reconstruction of the Bolshoi started it turned out that, say, some underground work came up, some places were damaged by fungal rot, which required additional expense," she said.

"Such difficulties, such things that could not be foreseen kept coming up at different stages of the reconstruction."

At the weekend, Russian media quoted the Bolshoi's Director General Anatoly Iksanov as saying the end of the renovation had been delayed by at least a year. Earlier this month, he said he hoped it would reopen between September and November 2008.

Uvarova declined to confirm the new 2009 estimate, saying all the examination work had to be completed before the deadline could be changed. Iksanov was not available for comment.