dirac Posted October 6, 2022 Share Posted October 6, 2022 Reviews of the Royal Ballet in "Mayerling." The Financial Times Quote A live cinema relay always guarantees a high-gloss finish, but the Royal Ballet was on exceptional form for the opening night of the new season. This revival of Kenneth MacMillan’s Mayerling marks the 30th anniversary of the choreographer’s death and Wednesday’s performance was a worthy tribute. Cast to the hilt — six principals in the line-up — it was powerfully played and danced thanks to luxury coaching from celebrated Macmillanists including Irek Mukhamedov, Leanne Benjamin and Edward Watson. The Daily Telegraph Quote It was 30 years ago this month that the great choreographer Kenneth MacMillan died of a heart-attack, backstage at the Royal Opera House, during a performance of his dark-as-night tragedy Mayerling. ... The Stage Quote Kenneth MacMillan’s ballet based on the real-life murder-suicide scandal of Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria, captures the complexity of relationships with glittering performances. The Times Quote Opening the new Royal Ballet season with Mayerling is certainly not playing it safe. Nothing beats Kenneth MacMillan’s grandiose 1978 ballet about the life and death of Crown Prince Rudolf, heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, as a study in aristocratic depravity. The title refers to the royal hunting lodge where, in 1889, Rudolf killed his teenage mistress, Baroness Mary Vetsera, then turned the gun on himself. In the ballet Rudolf is dissolute, drug-addled, sexually violent and psychologically damaged. And despite the fact that he interacts intimately with the five key women in his life the ballet is all about him. Link to comment
dirac Posted October 6, 2022 Author Share Posted October 6, 2022 More. The Independent Quote Kenneth MacMillan’s Mayerling is a ballet of doomed obsession. The hero is a prince, but this historical drama couldn’t be further from fairytale: it follows Rudolf, heir to the Austro-Hungarian empire, from his disastrous marriage to his death in a suicide pact with his teenage mistress, Mary Vetsera. MacMillan creates a whole world of needy, driven people, trapped in a stifling web of court politics, repression, and destructive emotion. CultureWhisper Quote Natalia Osipova’s Mary Vetsera is knowing beyond her 17 years. She comes to Rudolf’s chamber like a whirlwind of irresistible seduction, making straight for his bureau where she picks up his gun and fiercely points it at him. Rudolf cowers before slowly being drawn into her game, and the extended pas de deux that follows is one of the most intensely sexual in MacMillan’s canon. Its lifts and turns are also heart-stoppingly difficult, requiring fearless abandon and coordination. Slipped Disc Quote When it was new, the Royal Ballet fielded three casts; this season has five. Several women (Merle Park, Monica Mason, Alfreda Thorogood, Jennifer Penney among them) have danced two or three of its foremost roles; Genesia Rosato, Princess Louise at the 1978 premiere, went on to play no fewer than four other important Mayerling parts. Wednesday’s cast, led by Ryochi Hirano as Crown Prince Rudolf, featured two of today’s most prestigious international ballerinas, Marianela Nunez as Mitzi Caspar (the mistress to whom Rudolf first proposes the idea of a double suicide, but who betrays his idea to the Habsburg secret service) and Natalia Osipova as Mary Vetsera (the teenage mistress who joins him in both sex and death). Often today’s Royal Ballet feels like a hotel for international stars; in Mayerling, it’s a real company again. Bachtrack Quote Frustratingly, full Royal Opera House cast sheets remain digital only – an environmental move – although the scheduled leading roles are now printed in the 96-page programme book. Extra paper would be required for the 27 roles listed, ranging from the Emperor Franz Joseph I to Josef Bratfisch, Rudolf’s loyal Fiaker, who took his knowledge of the Mayerling incident with him to the grave. At the plot’s centre, is the ballet’s Hamlet-like leading role, a morphine-addicted crown prince tortured by anxiety and courted by Hungarian separatists. It’s a tour de force of emotional depths, not always fully plunged by Ryoichi Hirano whose doomed Rudolf does not, as yet, delve into the character’s unhinged personality. Link to comment
dirac Posted October 6, 2022 Author Share Posted October 6, 2022 Photo gallery of the Australian Ballet preparing "Romeo and Juliet." Quote The star-crossed lovers and feuding families return to the stage in a new production of John Cranko’s version of the Shakespeare tragedy. The ballet opens 7 October at the state theatre in Melbourne and then at the Sydney Opera House in December. Link to comment
dirac Posted October 6, 2022 Author Share Posted October 6, 2022 An interview with Lauren Anderson. Quote Lauren also discusses the upcoming Stages production, Plumshuga: The Rise of Lauren Anderson, which details her early life, her struggles with addiction, and the road to her recovery all set to music and dance. Link to comment
dirac Posted October 6, 2022 Author Share Posted October 6, 2022 Kyiv City Ballet's U.S. tour continues. Quote “Back home, we’re trying to stay connected with our parents and with our relatives. Some days we have a good news some days we have a sad news. This is life,” said Kozlov. “As artists we are used to traveling, we are used to work, we’re used to dance and going around the world but in this situation you always have this subconscious mind saying that you cannot go home right now, it’s not safe in there................... So we keep working and decide to do this work because we are good at it. We have been studying artists., We’re not warriors. We are warriors from the stage we can, we can show the Ukrainian spirit. So on the stage, we represent our country right now, before we represent the company now we feel like we represent all our country.” Link to comment
dirac Posted October 9, 2022 Author Share Posted October 9, 2022 A preview of Oregon Ballet Theatre's new season by Martha Ullman West for Oregon ArtsWatch. https://www.orartswatch.org/oregon-ballet-theatres-season-of-stories/ Quote As it is all over the country this fall, story is the operative word at Oregon Ballet Theatre. The company opens its 2022-23 season at Keller Auditorium this weekend and next, Oct. 8-16, with a collection of three short ones: Christopher Bruce’s “Hush,” a 30-minute distillation of a family saga; George Balanchine’s “Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux,” about a dancing relationship; and Christopher Stowell’s hour-long, thoroughly modern “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” which features one of the best marital rows in ballet. Felix Mendelssohn’s lush romantic score will be performed live by the OBT orchestra, led by company music director Niel De Ponte, at all performances, which is in itself cause for rejoicing. Link to comment
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