dance

The Invitation/Obsidian Tear/Within the Golden Hour, Royal Ballet

Hanna Weibye Monday, 30 May 2016

It shows you just how much Kenneth MacMillan changed ballet in this country that 1960's The Invitation, with its onstage rape, sexual grooming and child abuse, can act as the reassuring classic at the heart of the new Royal Ballet triple bill which opened on Saturday.

Jekyll & Hyde, Old Vic

Jenny Gilbert Friday, 27 May 2016

From time to time theatre managements hit on the idea that danced drama should be part of their remit. Nick Hytner flirted with it at the National in his day with a run of productions for Lloyd Newson and his company DV8. Now Matthew Warchus, his feet barely under the desk at the Old Vic, has commissioned a show from a young choreographer who has Matthew Bourne’s crown in his sights.

Carlos Acosta: A Classical Farewell, Birmingham Hippodrome

Hanna Weibye Saturday, 07 May 2016

Appearing before theatres full of middle-aged women in just your underpants is certainly one way to throw a retirement party. It may not be everybody's choice, but then Carlos Acosta is not like everybody, and never has been.

Frankenstein, Royal Ballet

Hanna Weibye Thursday, 05 May 2016

Another year, another new full-length story ballet from one of the Royal Ballet's in-house choreographers.

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BalletBoyz, Life, Sadler's Wells

Hanna Weibye Friday, 22 April 2016

Hearing that both Javier de Frutos and rabbit heads appear in the new BalletBoyz bill might give you pause. A choreographer so unafraid of graphic content that he started his career with naked one-man shows, and later made a piece about the Pope so sexually explicit and offensive that he got death threats – do the rabbit heads mean we're in for some kind of furvert orgy?

Mariinsky Ballet: Concerto DSCH, Sacre, Wales Millennium Centre

Nadine Meisner Sunday, 17 April 2016

On Thursday the Mariinsky Ballet and Orchestra swooped into Cardiff for the ballet company’s only UK dates this year. Appearing at the Wales Millennium Centre for just four ballet performances, plus a family concert of Peter and the Wolf, the Mariinsky’s arrival does seem an extravagant indulgence by its backers, especially with the decision to show exclusively contemporary, Western-style, ballet programmes.

She Said, English National Ballet, Sadler's Wells

Jenny Gilbert Friday, 15 April 2016

Why are there so few female choreographers? Tamara Rojo, bugged by the fact that in 20 years on the ballet stage she had never danced anything choreographed by a woman, has stopped wondering and started doing something about it.

The Winter's Tale, Royal Ballet

David Nice Wednesday, 13 April 2016

It was twelfth night for Christopher Wheeldon's two-year-old, three-act Shakespearean ballet, and this newcomer had one nervous anticipatory question.

theartsdesk in Berlin: Three Ballets

Hanna Weibye Sunday, 03 April 2016

In London, seeing the same ballet company do three different pieces in three different theatres over four nights would be some kind of festival. In Berlin, it's just business as usual – albeit quite a busy week! – for the hard-working Staatsballett.

Kaash, Akram Khan Company, Sadler's Wells

Hanna Weibye Friday, 04 March 2016

This new run of Kaash is an interesting test case for Akram Khan Company as its eponymous founder approaches his retirement from stage performance (forecast for next year). Kaash was Khan's first full-length work, created in 2002 and widely acclaimed at the time. But can Khan's older work stand up after 14 years in which Khan has consistently supplied the British dance scene with some of its most riveting shows (DESH, Gnosis, Sacred Monsters)?