Royal Ballet
Ballet biography wins top theatre book prizeWednesday, 28 April 2010The Society for Theatre Research’s book of the year award has been won by ballet critic Jann Parry for Different Drummer, her biography of the Royal Ballet choreographer Kenneth MacMillan. The book was chosen this morning in a tight finish at the... Read more... |
La Fille Mal Gardée, Royal BalletWednesday, 21 April 2010
If you're going to dance before the future King of England, and your company bears his family's crest, you'd better dance well. No one could really be in any doubt that the Royal Ballet would put on a grand show with its new revival of Frederick... Read more... |
Cinderella, Royal BalletSunday, 18 April 2010
No longer, it seems, need ballet's most transformable heroine languish by the seasonal fireside. It's true that you'll have to wait until Christmas to see the most visually striking Cinderella of all again - Ashley Page's fitfully ingenious Scottish... Read more... |
Concerto/The Judas Tree/Elite Syncopations, Royal BalletTuesday, 30 March 2010
Another night, another cast, another Judas Tree (see first-night review below this) - and yet more proof of what a tough, durable, shape-shifting piece Kenneth MacMillan created in his last year of life. Recently theartsdesk interviewee Thiago... Read more... |
Gang-Rape In Ballet: Thiago Soares and The Judas TreeSaturday, 20 March 2010
In a constantly challenging output of ballets, the remarkable choreographer Kenneth MacMillan produced nothing more upsetting than his last, The Judas Tree. Baldly, it portrays gang-rape, double murder and suicide among a nasty bunch of men on a... Read more... |
As One/ Rushes/ Infra, Royal BalletSaturday, 20 February 2010
Someone sharp as a whip thought hard about the price-fun balance of the latest Royal Ballet triple bill. An accountant, probably. Deep inside the cloisters of the Royal Opera House, they said: “Now top price stalls are £97 each for Romeo and... Read more... |
Q&A Special: Sarah Lamb, Royal Ballet Cover GirlThursday, 11 February 2010
You don’t usually find ballerinas in Monument Valley. Cowboys, maybe, but not a pale, slender girl in a glistening golden tutu alighting like an exotic butterfly briefly on a silk-shod toe in the very same red dust that John Wayne rattled across in... Read more... |
Romeo and Juliet, Royal BalletWednesday, 13 January 2010
There are times when critics sheathe their quill tips, others when they don’t. Rupert Pennefather, the tall blond Englishman who has been earnestly promoted by the Royal Ballet as hard as they can to be the next Jonathan Cope, has attracted some... Read more... |
Dance 2000-9: From Ballet to Hip HopThursday, 31 December 2009
The Noughts were a bonanza time for builders, scientists and bureaucrats in the dance arena, throwing up numerous fine dance venues and bases, collaborating intellectually with modern choreographers, or targeting social minorities, but the blazing... Read more... |
The Royal Ballet in Cuba, More4 / The Rite of Spring, BBC ThreeSaturday, 26 December 2009
There were some odd sights in Christmas Day viewing but none more discomfiting, I’d bet, than seeing a ballerina lying on a physio’s couch having a leg dragged quickly up to touch the side of her head while the other leg lay perfectly still pointing... Read more... |
Dance DVDs Round-Up 1Sunday, 20 December 2009
The improvement in ballet film from video to DVD has been colossal and welcome. The audio experience too has improved by leaps and bounds as it is more and more geared towards computers with earphones, rather than dodgy TVs. Hand in hand with... Read more... |
Les Patineurs & Tales of Beatrix Potter, Royal BalletTuesday, 15 December 2009
The well-prepared adult accompanying an under-10 to the Royal Ballet’s Tales of Beatrix Potter will take with them a pillow and a potty, the pillow for themselves, the potty to tuck under the seat for the necessary moment during this 70-minute... Read more... |
