what light through yonder window breaks?
Edward Watson rocks my world. He just does.
I saw him Mayerling some months ago and he caught my eye because he was absolutely brilliant as Prince Rudolph and held up so well under Macmillan's gruelling choreography, so I was really looking forward to seeing him dance Romeo tonight in another Macmillan ballet, Romeo & Juliet.
Ok, that picture is with Putrov and Marquez; if you want to see one of Edward Watson and Leanne Benjamin, then look here
The ballet was lovely; the music is Prokofiev, but as with most of what Macmillan chooses to choreograph, the music isn't really going to take your breath away. Which doesn't matter one little bit because the choreography is so wonderful that you'll be gaping, open-mouthed anyways. Macmillan likes to tell stories, or he likes to put dance to stories. And the story in the ballet is surprisingly faithful to Shakespeare, which was a nice surprise.
The set design was, of course, gorgeous, and the prima ballerina, Leanne Benjamin was brilliant and it was all wonderful and I liked it very much, if you hadn't guessed. Tybalt was played well, as were Mercutio and Benvolio, and it was really lovely because I seem to know the play quite well, to the point where I can quote decent bits of it (I'm not sure how that happened as I've never studied it nor seen it live and didn't particularly like the Luhrmann film) and whilst they were dancing bits out I could sort of hear the lines going through my head, like Romeo shouting "I am fortune's fool!" after killing Tybalt, not to mention Romeo's sweet mutterings before the balcony scene. So that was a bonus, kind of like a lovely mesh between literature, dance, music and acting (because ballet doesn't just require stamina, balance and a need for the ballerinas to be boneless, double jointed and emaciated, it requires acting skills. A decent performer can act the role, something Carlos Acosta reallllly needs to learn, cough cough) that all came together and played out beautifully.
I also managed to procure tickets to see Ashton's Sylvia in March, with Zenaida Yanowsky dancing the titular role. It's meant to be one of her best parts so I'm really, really looking forward to it.
So. That was lovely! More please!
There are some lovely pictures of the performance from Oct 30th with Watson and Benjamin here, if anyone's interested. Mostly for my reference cause I rather like looking at ballet photos, particularly of Edward Watson. Cough.
I saw him Mayerling some months ago and he caught my eye because he was absolutely brilliant as Prince Rudolph and held up so well under Macmillan's gruelling choreography, so I was really looking forward to seeing him dance Romeo tonight in another Macmillan ballet, Romeo & Juliet.
Ok, that picture is with Putrov and Marquez; if you want to see one of Edward Watson and Leanne Benjamin, then look here
The ballet was lovely; the music is Prokofiev, but as with most of what Macmillan chooses to choreograph, the music isn't really going to take your breath away. Which doesn't matter one little bit because the choreography is so wonderful that you'll be gaping, open-mouthed anyways. Macmillan likes to tell stories, or he likes to put dance to stories. And the story in the ballet is surprisingly faithful to Shakespeare, which was a nice surprise.
The set design was, of course, gorgeous, and the prima ballerina, Leanne Benjamin was brilliant and it was all wonderful and I liked it very much, if you hadn't guessed. Tybalt was played well, as were Mercutio and Benvolio, and it was really lovely because I seem to know the play quite well, to the point where I can quote decent bits of it (I'm not sure how that happened as I've never studied it nor seen it live and didn't particularly like the Luhrmann film) and whilst they were dancing bits out I could sort of hear the lines going through my head, like Romeo shouting "I am fortune's fool!" after killing Tybalt, not to mention Romeo's sweet mutterings before the balcony scene. So that was a bonus, kind of like a lovely mesh between literature, dance, music and acting (because ballet doesn't just require stamina, balance and a need for the ballerinas to be boneless, double jointed and emaciated, it requires acting skills. A decent performer can act the role, something Carlos Acosta reallllly needs to learn, cough cough) that all came together and played out beautifully.
I also managed to procure tickets to see Ashton's Sylvia in March, with Zenaida Yanowsky dancing the titular role. It's meant to be one of her best parts so I'm really, really looking forward to it.
So. That was lovely! More please!
There are some lovely pictures of the performance from Oct 30th with Watson and Benjamin here, if anyone's interested. Mostly for my reference cause I rather like looking at ballet photos, particularly of Edward Watson. Cough.