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.

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.

Another year, another new full-length story ballet from one of the Royal Ballet's in-house choreographers. Time was – a long time, in fact, up to 2011 – when that would have sounded like science fiction, but no longer: Liam Scarlett, whose Frankenstein premiered last night at the Opera House, is treading a path worn smooth in the past five years by Christopher Wheeldon, Wayne McGregor and Carlos Acosta.

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?

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.

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. ENB’s latest programme, an evening of three new commissions, sets out to show not only that women dance-makers can be just as accomplished as their better-known and vastly more numerous male counterparts, but also that their work can speak with a distinct voice.

It was twelfth night for Christopher Wheeldon's two-year-old, three-act Shakespearean ballet, and this newcomer had one nervous anticipatory question. The verbal music is gone, only the plot remains, so could A Winter's Tale the play inspire Wheeldon to imaginative heights in the way that Romeo and Juliet brought out the best in MacMillan, via Prokofiev?

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.

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)?

One of the secrets to enjoying life is mastering the creative use of disappointment. Many in the Covent Garden audience last night were no doubt deeply disappointed not to be seeing Natalia Osipova's legendary portrayal of the title role in Giselle, injury having removed the Russian superstar from the opening night cast.