Over the past decade, a night at the Bolshoi Ballet in Moscow became a night of endurance. If you managed to secure admission -- either through connections or by wrangling with the leather-jacketed thugs on the street who bought out the box office and then shilled tickets for the top balcony at a 400 percent markup -- if you made it past the coat-check molls, ignored the cold-water restrooms, and located your seat closer to Sputnik than the stage, you were still never sure you were in the right place.

After all, the footwork lacked precision. Dancers bobbled more landings than the Olympic gymnasts this summer. Dancers depicting young lovers looked bored and in need of couples counseling. You just expected more from a theater whose name means ``big.''

Apparently, so did the Russian government. In 1995, the Bolshoi Theatre retired its artistic director of three decades, Yuri Grigorovich. There have been four artistic directors since. The latest is a young buck who has been choreographing his way through the West. Alexei Ratmansky, 35, is a Russian who had danced and staged ballets in Russia, Canada and Denmark and already has brought new ideas and forms to the creaky Bolshoi stage. On the troupe's current North American tour, touching down in Berkeley Wednesday through Nov. 7, he's escorting a fresh crop of dancers who, Russian critics say, are dazzling with promise.

The dancers are saddled with the dual demands of upholding the traditions of classical Russian dance while shrugging off the political, monetary and artistic shackles that grounded the 200-member company while its St. Petersburg rival, the Kirov, took flight. Ticket holders will not see a new Bolshoi but a Bolshoi in transition.

``I'm trying to see what I can do without doing revolutionary changes,'' Ratmansky said in a phone interview from his Moscow office before the tour kicked off. ``It's such a machine, it's hard to turn.''

A new artistic director cannot start reassigning dancers and excising repertory, especially when the 148-year-old theater will close at season's end to undergo a long-overdue $350 million renovation. (The company will perform at a smaller, second stage.) In short, Ratmansky is trying to make changes without further cracking the foundation.

``The quality of dancing -- I wouldn't be so brave to say it has changed,'' said Ratmansky, who has danced lead roles with ballet companies in Kiev, Moscow and Copenhagen and was a soloist with the Royal Danish Ballet. ``I think we have to treasure and go with the stars of the Bolshoi, which is unique. I don't want them to be like all the other companies.''

One selection for their Berkeley appearance illustrates his goals. Bolshoi members will dance one work, Grigorovich's ``Raymonda,'' a full-length story ballet that, if performed at its best, should display the Russian school's precise technique and eye-popping athleticism.

The other work on display here, ``Romeo and Juliet'' a collaboration between Declan Donnellan and Radu Poklitaru, was unleashed on the world last year. Russian critics were enthusiastic, but the London press eviscerated the reinterpretation performed partly in clingy underclothes and bare feet.

Though casting is always subject to change, youngster Maria Alexandrova, a newly promoted principal, is expected to lead the opening night performance of ``Romeo and Juliet'' on Wednesday. She has been replacing star Galina Stepanenko, who was hurt in a fall. Alexandrova, her director said, ``is very promising and in the best of the Bolshoi tradition -- big jumps, dynamic, great technique. A great jumper -- this is a rare quality.'' Senior talent will include Nadezhda Gracheva.

It's clear as he names off the casts that Ratmansky is proud of his female principals. That's a change in the company's emphasis, given that the Bolshoi, by long prizing athletics over artistry, was viewed as a male dancer's den.

He has honed these young dancers' technique by assigning them to work with modern choreographers. The idea is to rejuvenate and refresh his corps, get them thinking and moving to unfamiliar work.

``I want to do as many new productions as possible and give dancers the opportunity to work with the choreographers,'' he said. ``They're developing as artists in the studio. Maybe the choreographers will create a special part, a special role, and open new sides of their personalities. That was my highlight as a dancer. I think it's true for all dancers. Instead of restaging old ballets all over again, to try new stuff.''

With that preparation, his company performed a night of three short, modern works, including Ratmansky's ``The Bright Stream,'' before a Russian audience. ``It was pretty radical for the Bolshoi, all very contemporary ballets,'' said Raymond Stults, ballet critic for the Moscow Times. It drew a young, enthusiastic audience.

Still, Ratmansky says he is charged with caring for one of the world's great classical companies, and that means archiving the great hits and retrieving old ones. He plans to resurrect several Soviet-era ballets -- forgotten classics of the '20s and '30s such as ``The Flames of Paris'' that helped bring new energy to the traditions of Western dance. The Soviets created big, risky partnering, with male leads flinging their partners into the air, and the famous ``fish dive,'' in which a female dancer leaps or falls into a nearly upside-down supported lift.

For now, those ballets will stay safely locked away as the new director tries to introduce a long-forgotten emotion into Bolshoi dancing: joy.

``We're working on getting back the feeling of expansiveness and happiness,'' he said. And the ticket scalping? He said that's being fixed as well.

Other cities will be treated to the modernist "Romeo and Juliet," staged by Declan Donnellan, that the Bolshoi unleashed on the world last year. Russian critics were enthusiastic, but the London press eviscerated the reinterpretation performed partly in clingy underclothes and bare feet. Perhaps more forgiving audiences await in Minneapolis and Berkeley, Calif.

Marius Petipa's comical "Don Q.," with its splashy egg beater fouettes and heroic Soviet-era jumps, will look positively quaint in comparison.

But for a man whose mission, for now, is to show off the best his company can be, it seems a wise choice. "Don Q." is "a signature ballet," Ratmansky said. "I think it represents the best of the Bolshoi -- a bit more free, more dramatic, than the Kirov. Not so academic."

Youngsters Maria Alexandrova, a newly promoted principal, will lead off as Raymonda, replacing star Galina Stepanenko, who was hurt in a fall. Alexandrova, her director said, "is very promising and in the best of the Bolshoi tradition -- big jumps, dynamic, great technique. A great jumper -- this is a rare quality." Senior talent will include Nadezhda Gracheva, who will perform the lead in "Don Q." on Saturday.

"She's great in adagio and she's very experienced and very musical," Ratmansky said.

It's clear as he names off the casts that Ratmansky is proud of his female principals. That's a change in the company's emphasis, given that the Bolshoi, by long prizing athletics over artistry, was viewed as a male dancer's den.

He has honed these young dancers' techniques by assigning them to work with modern choreographers. The idea is to rejuvenate and refresh his corps, get them thinking and moving to unfamiliar work.

"I want to do as many new productions as possible and give dancers the opportunity to work with the choreographers," he said. "They're developing as artists in the studio. Maybe the [choreographers] will create a special part, a special role, and open new sides of their personalities. That was my highlight as a dancer. I think it's true for all dancers. Instead of restaging old ballets all over again, to try new stuff."

With that preparation, his company performed a night of three short, modern works, including Ratmonsky's "The Bright Stream," before a Russian audience. "It was pretty radical for the Bolshoi, all very contemporary ballets," said Raymond Stults, ballet critic for The Moscow Times. It drew a young, enthusiastic audience.

Still, Ratmansky says he is charged with caring for one of the world's great classical companies, and that means archiving the great hits and retrieving old ones. He plans to resurrect several Soviet-era ballets -- forgotten classics of the '20s and '30s such as "The Flames of Paris" that helped incinerate the constraining traditions of Western dance. The Soviets created big, risky partnering, with male leads flinging their partners into the air, and the famous "fish jump," in which the dancer took off from one point and landed yards away.

For now, those ballets will stay safely locked away as the new director tries to introduce a long-forgotten emotion into Bolshoi dancing: joy.

"We're working on getting back the feeling of expansiveness and happiness," he said. And the ticket scalping? He said that's being fixed as well.