His increasingly high profile did not go down well with the communist authorities and, having been ordered back to Moscow from a Kirov tour in 1961, he decided not to get on the plane, instead pleading, successfully, to be granted political asylum.
The French authorities complied but it was Britain that saw the best of Nureyev as a dancer, most famously in his legendary partnership with Margot Fonteyn at the Royal Opera House.
Off-stage, Nureyev had a long term relationship with the Danish dancer Erik Bruhn, who died in 1986. But according to Pontois, he was, essentially, a solitary character.
“He had been obliged to abandon his family (in the Soviet Union),” she recalled. “That left him with a lot of guilt, it was a heavy burden.”Having successfully hidden the extent of his illness for some time, Nureyev effectively announced it to the world when he appeared, gaunt and frail, at a premiere of “La Bayadere” two months before his death.
“It is always hard when someone doesn't know when to leave the stage, but for him it really was a question of life or death,” said Pontois. “He dedicated his life to dance.”Ballet companies around the world are paying tribute to the dancer two decades after his death.
The Paris Opera hosts a gala night on Sunday, with his “Sleeping Beauty”running as part of its 2013/2014 season and his “Nutcracker” in 2014/2015.
London's Royal Ballet this month stages Nureyev's “Raymonda”, followed next month by “Marguerite and Armand”, while the Vienna Opera ballet plans a Nureyev gala on June 29 and San Francisco's De Young Museum is showcasing his stage costumes until February.
And come September the Kremlin ballet will perform his “Cinderella” - a milestone for Russia, where authorities stung by his defection blacked out all information about him even as his international career soared.
A posthumous homecoming for Nureyev, who had returned to his native land after 26 years in exile, only to find his ailing mother did not recognise him, and the Russian public knew nothing of his stellar rise.