Pinocchio

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Ballet Theatre UK, Pinocchio, Rotherham Civic Theatre, 4 June 2016

With perfect timing Ballet Theatre UK performed Pinocchio at the Rotherham Civic Theatre on the very afternoon that the English Defence League were demonstrating in the town centre thereby distracting 800 officers from all parts of South Yorkshire from their normal duties (see South Yorkshire Police and Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council grateful for disorder free demonstrations 4 June 2016). Even though their demonstration is likely to have deterred many from venturing into Rotherham to see the show the company's excellent young artists still managed to attract a better audience than the demonstrators and counter-demonstrators combined which says a lot for BTUK and also a lot for Rotherham.

I have always had a lot of time for BTUK who regularly bring fresh, new full length ballets to small auditoriums the length and breadth of the United Kingdom.  The Birmingham Royal Ballet has its midscale tours of three theatres in the North and Midlands and three in the South and West Country every May in order to bring ballet to new audiences. Last year Northern Ballet started to do the same with Madame Butterfly and are doing the same right now with Jane Eyre.  BTUK however do that sort of thing all the time.  Between 25 March and 19 June 2016 they will have performed Pinocchio in 36 venues often covering enormous differences with a few hours. For instance, between 1 and 5 June they will have travelled between Peterborough, Solihull, Great Yarmouth, Rotherham and Buxton.  I have reviewed several of BTUK's shows (see Pure Delight - BTUK's Little Mermaid in Southport 27 April 2014, The Bedouin of Ballet 12 Dec 2014 and Ballet Theatre UK's Aladdin 5 April 2015) and I know from the buzz in the bars that their performances are very much appreciated.

The story of Pinocchio is about a puppet that comes to life which when you think about it is not all that different from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein which Liam Scarlett has recently turned into a ballet (see Rarely have I been so impressed by a new ballet 19 May 2016). However it is a lot less dark than Frankenstein though it is at least as complicated. Like Frankenstein the story focuses on what distinguishes a human from an intelligent machine which, of course, is also a theme of Coppelia.  It is remarkable how three 19th century stories all of which have been transposed into ballet have something to say about artificial intelligence now that our technology is on the point of delivering it.

Because the story is complicated it is difficult to follow the ballet without a synopsis and because I arrived at the theatre just seconds before the curtain rose I did not get mine until the end. The only part of the story I could remember was that Pinocchio was made of wood and that his nose would grow whenever he told a lie. Although I could recognize a fox and a cat I became hopelessly confused by the blue fairies, the circus, the schoolchildren and the signpost pointing to "School" in one direction and "Fun" in the other. Now that I have read the synopsis it all makes perfect sense.

The ballet starts off with a romantic scene that reminded me a little of Bournonville's Napoli. David Brewer is the craftsman Gepetto and Ines Ferreira is his bride.  I followed the bit where she died and came back to life as a blue fairy. I also followed the construction of the puppet and his awkwardly coming to life. Although I could recognize Emma Miller as a fox, Pedro Santos as a cat and Amy Keenan as some kind of insect (she turned out to be a cricket) and that they had been waylaid by Vincent Cabot and Charlotte Laura Eades in a circus it was not obvious to me what the school kids (especially the punchy little boy Lampwick danced by Sarah Mortimer) had to do with the story until after the performance.

If, as is likely, the company have children in mind, the choreographer might consider some sort of narration or voice over as Ballet Cymru did for Roald Dahl's Little Red Riding Hood and the Three Little Pigs or English National Ballet's My First Coppelia. A programme does help a lot but even if I had received it before the show I would have needed time to digest the complicated plot. Not all children's ballets need narration. Ballet Black's Dogs Don't Do Ballet gets by without one. But this one does.

Nevertheless, Pinocchio is a gorgeous show with great sets by Martyn Plant and costumes by Daniel Hope. The music is beautiful and Christopher Moore's choreography is delightful. The ballet is coming to the end of its travels but you can still  catch it at Horsham, Stourport, Middlesbrough, Chesterfield, Margate, Exmouth or Neath. Whether you are young or old, ballet newby or ballet snob, you should try to see this work. It is the best I have seen from BTUK to date and I am now a bigger fan of this great little company than ever.

Oh and just a word about Rotherham. It is a great place for fantasy. There is a "magical apothecary" in the town centre called Grimm & Co. from which humans are excluded. I kid you not. Rotherham is a great little town and that's just the sort of fantasy and fun its kids and grown ups need. Not the politics of fear and hate.

Let it snow - Ballet Theatre UK's Autumn and Winter Tour

One of my favourite ballet companies is Ballet Theatre UK, They have some lovely young dancers: David Brewer, Ines Ferreira and Sarah Mortimer to name just three. They work incredibly hard travelling sometimes hundreds of miles for one or at the most two performances and then back on the road again. Look at their tour dates for their Autumn and Winter tour: Coventry on the 23 Oct (the company's website says the 25 by the way), Wimborne on the 24 and Bognor on the 25. And yet when they come on stage they seem fresh and full of energy.

By touring the small towns and suburbs of the UK they are bringing ballet to an audience that would never otherwise see it. Yes I know that the Birmingham Royal Ballet splits into two and tours some of the smaller venues of Northern and Southern England (see Vaut le Voyage - Birmingham Royal Ballet in Shrewsbury 28 May 2015 and Birmingham Royal Ballet in High Wycombe 31 May 2015) and that Northern Ballet has just completed a tour of smaller theatres with Madame Butterfly (see Nixon's Masterpiece 22 May 2015) but these talented and incredibly resilient young men and women do that sort of thing all the time. Through their work they are removing some of the elitism and snobbery of ballet for which I for one am extremely grateful. To appreciate why that's important, read For Emma 28 April 2014 an article that I wrote after their visit to Southport.

In order to draw an audience the company's artistic director Christopher Moore bases his ballets around well known stories. Ballet Theatre UK performed The Little Mermaid in Spring 2014 (see Pure Delight - BTUK's Little Mermaid in Southport 27 April 2014), Swan Lake (albeit with a radically different libretto to take account of the size and structure of the company which annoyed some people but not me) last Autumn and Winter (see The Bedouin of Ballet 12 Dec 2014) and Aladdin earlier this year (Ballet Theatre UK's Aladdin 5 April 2015). This time the company is reviving The Snow Queen which is based on Hans Christian Andersen's well known fairy tale.

I have no doubt that this show will draw in the crowds from Coventry to Yeovil and I shall see them on one of their transits from the North but I do have a plea to Mr Moore as a reviewer. Please - pretty please - type out a cast list for each of your venues and get the local Staples to run off as many copies as you've sold tickets. It'll only cost a few quid and it will pay dividends in audience (and critics') goodwill. It really will. Also the dancers will be acknowledged - and these fine young men and women deserve to be acknowledged. Up to now I have been relying on the mother of one of the dancers to give me the cast lists but she is a busy lady with her own dance classes (see There's more to Harpenden than Thameslink 17 May 2015). Alternatively, invest in an easel and pin up the names in the foyer as Matthew Bourne's New Adventures does.

Ballet Theatre UK also has a school which I shall discuss in a future post. One day I hope to meet Mr Moore and learn more about his vision and ambition for the company. If you have not yet seen this company do go to one of their shows. I have not yet met anyone - including grizzlies like me who can remember Fonteyn and Fracci - who has not left the theatre in which they have performed on a high.

BTUK's Aladdin Second Time Round

I attended Ballet Theatre UK's performance of Aladdin in Southport with Jane and her family on 4 April 2015 (see Ballet Theatre UK's Aladdin 5 April 2015). Like Jane I was annoyed at having to wait outside the auditorium until minutes before the start of the show and the lack of programmes and cast sheets.

I saw the show again at The Key Theatre in Peterborough on Saturday and I am glad to say that it had improved greatly. I set out my immediate reactions in a text to Jane who had been watching the Dutch National Ballet Junior Company at the Linbury. I wrote:

"Performance polished, refined and graceful. The pas de deux was as smooth as a baby's bottom. Real improvement on last time and very well articulated by the dancers. The male dancers as a group were very well composed and extremely responsive to the score and well disciplined."

The production was more polished in other ways. In Southport some of the dancers seemed to be in danger of losing their costumes. Nothing like that happened in Peterborough.

However, there were still no cast lists or programmes making it difficult for me to identify the dancers and I found that really annoying. It is also  unfortunate that the dancers do not get the credit they deserve. I appreciate that BTUK must have lots of overheads with its extensive touring but a Xeroxed cast list or even just a sign on an easel at the entrance to the auditorium (which is what Matthew Bourne's company does) would hardly break the bank. We were after all paying nearly £20 per head for our tickets. I might add that many theatre goers keep a programme as a souvenir of their evening.  With a programme they are much more likely to come twice.

Another reason why the absence of a programme was annoying is that there was no synopsis. It was not easy to follow what is going on. That is partly because the choreography was too complex. Each sequence was exquisite. The costumes and coiffures were gorgeous. But it was all too much.The ballet would have benefited from far fewer scenes, particularly in Act I. The succession of dances complicated rather than elucidated the story. The changes of costume did little to assist my comprehension.

 I attended the ballet with an enthusiastic family member who was born in Mumbai but who had lived in this country for many years. She had read the story of Aladdin twice and was reasonably familiar with it. This was her first experience of ballet and I suggested Aladdin to her because of its oriental theme, colour and music which I thought might appeal to her tastes. As it happened I was right. She did enjoy all that as well as the pointe work but she asked me several times to explain what was happening and I was not really able to help her. There must have been many people like us in the audience and if they can't understand a performance there is a risk that they will conclude that ballet is not for them.

In the absence of a cast list I think the following roles were danced by the following dancers:

• Aladdin David Brewer
• Princess Ines Ferreira
• Genie Philip Tunstall
• Slave of the Ring Jessica Hill
• Magician Vincent Cabot
• Sultan Robert Noble

The reason I say "I think" is that I got this cast list from Jane who got it from Helen Brewer (David's mum and the lady who runs the Harpenden Summer Dance School). Helen originally told Jane that that cast would dance the matinee performance. I think I recognized David and Ines because they had danced those roles in Southport last time.

Being a sports fan I am used to looking out for a man or woman of the match. In this ballet I would award the person of the match  (overall best dancer) to Ines and man of the match (best male dancer) to David. Having seen the same ballet in diametrically opposite parts of England I consulted their website to see where else they danced.  They do go to a lot of places. I counted over 50 shows in just short of 4 months. The distances they have to cover between venues in a very short time are considerable. I feel really sorry for the young dancers.  It all makes me wonder whether a little less could yield so much more.

I should like to say a word about the Key Theatre. It is a very pleasant venue on the banks of the Nene. It is quite a modern building and all facilities were in order. It has an elegant restaurant with great service where we savoured asparagus and poached egg with Hollandaise sauce and beautiful French fries. Generous portions too. Save for the lack of programmes and cast lists it was a much better experience than at the Atkinson."

Other Reviews

6 June 2015    RhodaKuc   BalletcoForum