The Royal Ballet's Mayerling on Stage and Screen

Crown Prince Rudolf

 

The Royal Ballet Mayerling Royal Opera House, 29 Nov 2022 19:30

Schloß Mayerling is now a Carmelite convent. In 1889 it was a royal hunting lodge where Rudolf, the 30-year-old Crown Prince of the Austro-Hungarian empire, and Mary Vetsera, an impressionable 17-year-old, killed themselves. Details of their deaths were suppressed for many years but the truth eventually emerged.  In 1978 Sir Kenneth MacMillan created a ballet on the story to the music of Franz Liszt with designs by Nicholas Georgiadis. I saw the work in the cinema in October and on stage at the Royal Opera House on 29 Nov 2022. 

While not exactly a barrel of laughs it is one of MacMillan's most frequently performed ballets.  It is not hard to see why.  It has exciting choreography, enchanting music, elaborate sets and lavish costumes. For many years the Royal Ballet was the only company to stage Mayerling.  There are now several others in the United States, Germany and Scotland.  Scottish Ballet's was based on Sir Kenneth's choreography and staged with his widow's cooperation.  I missed it because I was recovering from a hip injury when it was on tour. 

The performance that I saw last Tuesday evening was one of my best nights at the ballet in a lifetime of theatre-going. That was despite last-minute cast changes resulting from an injury to Steven McRae.  Having seen Ryoichi Hirano on screen I had been looking forward to a very different interpretation from McRea.  I also wanted to see Kristin McNally as Sissi, Anne Rose O'Sullivan as  Rudolf's long-suffering wife and Bradfordian Thomas Whitehead as Colonel Bay Middleton.  Having said that I was not in the least disappointed by those who took their place.

The role that MacMillan created for Prince Rudolf is pretty close to the historical character.  An exceptionally privileged individual who could literally get away with murder (or at least manslaughter) but also a very trapped one.  A figure readily deserving contempt but also sympathy and compassion. Hirano stimulated all those emotions in me.  Contempt as he humiliated his bride in a brothel or threatened women with his pistol but compassion as he drank himself crazy minutes before he blew his brains out.  The role requires outstanding virtuosity.  It requires a rare talent to carry all that off but that is exactly what Hirano did.

There are four important female roles in Mayerling:  

• Mary, Baroness Vetsora who agreed to die with him
• Mitzi who most certainly would not
• Rudolf's wife, Princess Stephanie of Belgium, and 
• his mother, Empress Sissi.

Akane Takada brought Mary to life with her sweetness and delicacy. Perhaps more than brought her to life because the real Mary was little more than a child when she met Rudolf.  Leticia Dias was a streetwise Mitzi, picking herself up and carrying on even after a police raid.  Yuhui Choe danced Stephanie. Her indignation was palpable as she was dragged to a brothel.  Itziar Mendizabal danced the Empress exactly as I would have imagined her,

The Hapsburgs who had ruled Austria since the 13th century were approaching their end by the late 19th century. Like contemporary Britain, they faced challenges from nationalists represented in the ballet by the 4 Hungarian officers, Luca Acri, Benjamin Ella, Joseph Sissons and David Yudes.    There was more than a little sleaze as represented by the sex workers.   A flawed royal family had their extra-marital support in such characters as Sisi's lover Colonel Middleton danced by Nicol Edmonds.

The Royal Ballet's "Onegin"

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Royal Ballet Onegin Royal Opera House 18 Jan 2020, 13:30

The last time I saw the Royal Ballet's Onegin, I wrote:

"That night I saw something wonderful. Cranko's Onegin danced by Matthew Golding in the title role, Natalia Osipova as Tatiana, Matthew Ball as Lensky and Bennet Gartside as Prince Gremin. It was quite simply the most enjoyable performance by the Royal Ballet that I had seen since the days of Sibley and Dowell." (See Onegin: the most enjoyable performance that I have seen at the House since Sibley and Dowell 21 Feb 2015).

Although I knew what to expect and saw a very different interpretation with Thiago Soares in the title role, Itziar Mendizabal as Tatiana, David Donnelly as Lensky and Meaghan Grace Hinkis as Olga, I was as thrilled second time around as I had been the first time I saw the ballet.

As before, it was the choreography that thrilled me.  In my 2015 review, I described John Cranko as my favourite choreographer of all time and so he remains.   I said: "Cranko understood and interpreted music in a way that produces a fluency that is instantly recognizable but hard to describe".  But that was not all.  I added:  "He was also a great storyteller with a sense of humour."  Not so much humour perhaps as in The Taming of the Shrew which remains my favourite work by Cranko but there is a great story of which many of us in the English speaking world would otherwise have been unaware.

Soares's Onegin was very different from Golding's.  I had described Goldring's portrayal as "steely, amoral but ultimately foolish" but I saw complexities in Onegin's character that I had missed before.  I believe that he was conflicted and he had certainly matured between his duel with Lensky and his reacquaintance with Tatiana in St Petersburg.  Maybe I would have picked that up from seeing the ballet again but I am not sure.  Soares has the ability to communicate mood and maybe even thought.

I also learnt something new about Tatiana from Mendizabal. With Osipova I sensed revenge in the last act but Mendizabal seemed much more conflicted. It was if she still had feelings for Onegin despite the way he had humiliated her at her party and the quite unnecessary duel with Lemsky. She must have known that running away with him would have ruined her.  She would have thought that if he was capable of dropping her once he could do it again.  She had a good husband.  All that anyone could want.  And yet,  She was tempted.  Happily, she listened to her head rather than her heart and sent Onegin packing.  Some ballets do have a happy ending.

Grace Hinkis was a great Olga and Donnelly a loyal but headstrong Lensky.  Watching the run-up to the duel was like watching a video of a train crash in slow motion. A bit like the scene in Romeo and Juliet where Mercution picks a fight with Tybalt that possibly end well.     

There are some steps for the corps that must require lots of rehearsing. For instance, the folk dance towards the end of Act I with the girls' jetés on the arms of their partners who march off stage but do not run.

Jurgen Rose's set designs, particularly of the outdoor scenes and especially the venue for the duel, impressed me as much as they did the first time I saw them. The first rays of dawn were a triumph of lighting design.  The costumes were gorgeous.  I am not a big fan of rearranging music that was never intended for dance I make an exception for Kurt-Heinz Stoltze's score.

I had expected the matinee to be eclipsed by English National Ballet's gala at the Coliseum which I saw a few hours later but, if anything, it was the other way round.  Onegin is a great classical ballet created in our own time which is why so many leading companies around the world stage it.

The Winter's Tale - Close to Perfection though perhaps not quite there yet

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The Royal Ballet  The Winter's Tale 15 Feb 2018, 19:30 Royal Opera House

I have now seen Christopher Wheeldon's The Winter's Tale three times on stage and at least twice on screen and it has definitely grown on me.  The first time I saw it I was less than overwhelmed.  I wrote in Royal Ballet The Winter's Tale 14 April 2014:

"I expected so much of The Winter's Tale. I had been looking forward to it for months. A new work by Christopher Wheeldon based on Shakespeare by a fine choreographer for our national company with a stellar cast. It should have blown me off my feet. Well I quite liked the show but blown off my feet? I wasn't."

I liked it a lot better when I saw it in the cinema a few weeks later (see The Winter's Tale - A Time to eat my Hat 29 April 2014) and even more when I saw it again in 2016 (see The Winter's Tale Revisited - Some Ballets are better Second Time Round 20 April 2016).

Thursday's performance was for me the best ever.  I tweeted:

Thoroughly enjoyed @TheRoyalBallet's Winter's Tale last night. Never seen Nunez, Soares, Stix-Brunnell and Bracewell dance better. My review will appear in https://t.co/1UvITcDv6f very soon. I have really grown to love that ballet over the last few years.

— Terpsichore (@jelterps) February 16, 2018

Yes, it is a lovely work - an uplifting story to a gorgeous score performed by some of the world's finest dancers in the grandest auditorium in England.  Pretty close to perfection.

Close to perfection but perhaps still not quite there.  I saw the ballet on Thursday with my friend Gita. She has seen a lot of ballet as well as other kinds of dance and attended a lot of adult ballet classes and even a few intensives. She watched the ballet with me on telly when it was broadcast one Christmas but this was the first time she had seen it on stage. Interestingly, her comments were very much the same as those that I had made in my first review. Fine choreography, great dancing, lovely music but the first act dragged a bit, the sets and especially the animations were distracting, she did not really get the bear and the ballet as a whole was far too long. Thinking about it again I couldn't say she is wrong but that does not mean that it is not a great work. On the contrary, I think it will keep its place in the repertoires of both the Royal Ballet and National Ballet of Canada and over the years it will evolve into something even better.  Especially if future producers do a bit of judicious pruning here and there,

Because it had been my birthday on Wednesday, Gita and I pushed the boat out a little.  We booked seats in the centre stalls close enough to see the expressions of the dancers but far enough back to take in the stage as a whole.  We dined in the Paul Hamlyn which meant that we could keep our table relax and reflect in the intervals. I have been to Covent Garden many times and it never fails to impress but to get the full the majesty of the place you have to sit in the stalls. Surrounded by red and gold, enveloped by light with the buzz of the audience I involuntarily squeaked with delight.

The lights dimmed and Kevin O'Hare entered the stage with the news that Alondra de la Parra was indisposed but Tom Seligman had stepped in to take her place.  Now Maestro Seligman is very good and he conducted confidently. So confidently in fact that he was already half way across the stage when the ballerina was about to invite him to take a bow and he was also the last performer to take a curtain call.  However, I had been looking forward to see Ms de la Parra. There are not many women conductors.  All those I have seen, such as Jane Glover and Marin Alsop, were extremely good. I have never seen a woman before an orchestra at Covent Garden and I would have been proud to see Ms de la Parra there. No doubt there will be other opportunities to see her and I wish her well.

I have seen Marianela Nuñez quite a few times over the years but I don't think I have ever seen dance better than her performance as Hermione on Thursday night. The same goes for Thiago Soares who danced Leontes, Beatriz Stix-Brunell as Perdita, William Bracewell as Polixenes,  Vadim Muntagirov as Florizel, Itziar Mendizabal as Paulina and Bradford lad, Thomas Whitehead, as the shepherd. Coming from Yorkshire, Gita and I applauded him particularly vigorously (as I always do) when he took his bow. Did he notice, I wonder?  Gita likes to choose a man or woman of the match. I can't remember whom she chose but the dancer who impressed me most on Thursday was Mendizabal. Paulina speaks truth to power but remains faithful to her awful boss and leads him back to his senses. She holds the show together. The role requires very careful casting and Mendizabal was the  right choice.

I loved the music, the choreography, the designs and special effects (except the bear) and the costumes (which, Gita said, showed Indian Sub-Continent influences). Once again I was close to tears at the final reunion of Perdita and her parents. Indeed the whole last act is a tear jerker. Yet again I loved the dancing round the tree.  Act 1 needs to be in the work to set the scene but I wish it were not quite so long.  Perhaps the last bit of act 1 could be added to the second act.  But these are minor niggles. Taken as a whole Thursday's performance was really good. If I did not have a ticket for the Dutch National Ballet's Don Quixote that evening I would see it again at the pictures when it is screened across the  world on the 28 Feb. If you can get to see it at least in the cinema but preferably on stage I strongly recommend it.

Gems

Lauren CuthbertsobRoyal Ballet Jewels Royal Opera House

Photo Helen McDonough
© 2017 Helen McDonough, all rights reserved
Reproduced with kind permission of the author

Helen McDonough

The Royal Ballet, Jewels, Royal Opera House, 1 April 2017, 14:00

Last Saturday I went to ROH to see the matinee of Jewels. It was wonderful I really enjoyed it and I came away ever grateful to Mr B for looking in that window at Van Cleef & Arpels in New York 50 years ago and being inspired to create this ballet - one of my all time favourites!

Emeralds

Photo Helen McDonough
© 2017 Helen McDonough, all rights reserved
Reproduced with kind permission of the author

Emeralds was beautiful I really love that piece for its elegant dancing and the gorgeous Faure score which I find so calming. Yasmine Naghdi and Matthew Ball were the main couple and danced like it was second nature to them and not their debut! I thought Yasmine was really beautiful. Itizar Mendizabal did the other lead with the clock-work like arm and leg moves - she was nice but Leanne Benjamin, whom I saw years ago, is the one to get those moves spot on. I really enjoyed watching the corps with all the patterns and intricate weaving in and out that Balanchine so loves.

Rubies

Photo Helen McDonough

© 2017 Helen McDonough, all rights reservedReproduced with kind permission of the author

In Rubies we had Tierney Heap as the "Tall Girl" - she was very good. The couple was danced by Alexander Campbell and Akane Takada. They were all great. It is such a fun piece and at one point though Tierney ran out of music! She was still dancing but the orchestra had finished the music - Pavel Sorokin conducting perhaps did not have his eye quite on the dancers?! Alexander Campbell had a lot of fun especially where he danced with the male corps being chased by them - he was not quite as fast as Steven McRae with the spins but that is Steven's speciality I think! Akane Takada was a surprise choice for me in Rubies as I thought Emeralds might be more "her". However, she danced beautifully as she always does.

Diamonds on this occasion was my favourite piece it was just stunning. I was mesmerised by it. Lauren Cuthbertson and Vadim Muntagirov danced the lead couple and their grand PDD was just fabulous. The brush of hands, very light touches and regal elegance of their dance was just gorgeous to watch. Vadim has really matured since I last saw him in a major performance and his command of the stage has grown. He did some amazing tours en l'air in a large circle and landed so softly from all his jumps. His partnering of Lauren was always very considerate - a real "danseur noble" as they say! It was such a refreshing change for me to see these 2 dance Diamonds as previously I always seem to have seen Marianela Nunez and Thiago Soares who are good, but I needed a change and yesterday I got it in spades. The corps de ballet were great in Diamonds and the choreography was so wonderful to watch with its complex patterns - all best seen from above as per my seat. It is a credit to all the dancers and repetiteurs that the patterns worked so well - squares, lines, crisscrossing over, circles you name it it is in there - what a genius Mr B was! Then the finale with the crescendo of music was just spine tingling and really left me wanting more. 

For some reason, there was no "red run" at the end of any piece which was a pity, but the applause was enthusiastic for all three pieces. I shall be going to the cinema relay next week to see the main cast, but I would really love to see this cast again, I was so impressed. If you can get a ticket I would highly recommend seeing this run of Jewels as The Royal Ballet seem to be on really good form with lots of the younger dancers coming up and doing really well. The future looks very bright at ROH at the moment!

The Winter's Tale Revisited - Some Ballets are better Second Time Round

Antigonus and the Bear from The Winter's Tale 

Author: Thomas Bragg (printmaker)
Folger Shakespeare Library Digital Image Collection

Source Wikipedia

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The Royal Ballet, The Winter's Tale, Royal Opera House, 16 April 2016

Sometimes a dish tastes better second time round. That may be because the meat has a chance to marinate. Or it may be because of a mood change. If you've set your heart on fish and chips and that's no longer on the menu nothing on earth is going to make you enjoy Yorkshire pudding and onion gravy in the same way however tasty that may be.

Theatre can be a bit like that. You see a performance one day and it washes over you. You  see the same show again some time later perhaps with a different cast and it really speaks to you. That has happened to me with Christopher Wheeldon's adaptation of The Winter's Tale.  When I saw it for the first time just over two years ago I thought it was sort of OK but nowt to write home about as we say in Yorkshire and I regret that I damned it with faint praise (see Royal Ballet "The Winter's Tale" 14 April 2014). I wrote:

"I expected so much of The Winter's Tale. I had been looking forward to it for months. A new work by Christopher Wheeldon based on Shakespeare by a fine choreographer for our national company with a stellar cast. It should have blown me off my feet. Well I quite liked the show but blown off my feet? I wasn't."

I saw it again on Monday and loved it unreservedly.

Why the change? I think the reason I didn't get The Winter's Tale the first time round was that I had just not been in the mood for it.  As I wrote at the time:

"Now I have to say that I was not in the most receptive frame of mind when I entered the Royal Opera House. I had a horrible journey down to London and I had been working late throughout the previous night. I had skipped breakfast and had only a light lunch. Consequently I was tired and hungry. Had I not paid a lot of money for my ticket I would have gone straight to bed. Moreover, the reason that I had to work through the night was that I had spent a couple of hours in Huddersfield town hall listening to the Choral's performing one of the most memorable concerts I have ever attended or am ever likely to attend. It may be that anything after that concert was going to be an anticlimax."

In fact, I began to appreciate the ballet when I saw it on screen a few days later (see The Winter's Tale - Time to eat my Hat 29 April 2014).  I enjoyed it all the more when I saw it again on on telly on Christmas day.

On Monday I was in the mood for Wheeldon's ballet even though I had been up since 04:00 our time in order to catch my flight home from Budapest after a memorable experience the night before and a hard day's work in London. It is a very satisfying work, architectural in its symmetry with recurring features such as the colour coding of the courts of Bohemia and Sicilia, the bands on stage in all three acts, the moving statues, the trees and galleons .... I could go on. There is much drama in his choreography such as Leontes's contortions to denote his jealousy in act 1 and the symbolic reconciliation of the laying on of hands in act III first by Perdita and Florizel and later by her father. That moment and also the reunion of Perdita with her parents a few moments later had me close to tears. There are moments of great joy such as the folk dancing in act II that I have always liked:

"Act II is very different. Set around a gnarled moss covered tree there is a festival with exuberant dancing accompanied by the most infectiously vibrant music. Perdita danced by Sarah Lamb and Florizel by Stephen McRae fall in love. They are spied on and discovered by Polixenes, king of Bohemia, who threatens to kill them but they set sail to Sicily with the king of Bohemia in hot pursuit. Little details like the fact that Bohenia is landlocked don't seem to have bothered Shakespeare or even Wheeldon. However there is such a thing as poetic licence and this is a case where it applies. Nevertheless, this is is the best bit of the ballet and that is possibly because it is the part that owes least to Shakespeare."

This time I loved it. Similarly, I have always  enjoyed Joby Talbot's score: "Valiant Talbot" as he is described by Nigel Bates in the programme notes. And the special effects - especially the ships and even the bear with its ghostly muzzle - were outstanding.

Did I like this cast more than the last one?  I don't think that could have been possible as I admire Cuthbertson, Lamb, McRae and Watson enormously. But Marianela Nuñez was a magnificent Hermione, Beatriz Stix-Brunell a delightful Perdita, Vadim Muntagirov a charming Florizel and Bennet Gartside reflected the torrent of emotions in Leontes's head brilliantly. Monday was the first time I had noticed Itziar Mendizabal. She danced Paulina, loyal to Hermione and Leontes, and the agent of their reunion and reconciliation which is one of the most moving scenes in any ballet. As he comes from Bradford it is always a pleasure to see Thomas Whitehead. He danced the old shepherd on Monday.

I would love to see this ballet again and I think I owe it to the dancers to see the same cast as I saw in 2014. There will be performances of the work between now and the 10 June.