Down memory lane
Giannandrea Poesio
Birmingham Royal Ballet Sadler’s Wells Theatre The preservation of national choreographic heritages has long been a concern of those who fear globalisation in the performing arts. Dance practitioners, dance administrators and dance academics thus resort to all sorts of devices to prevent the loss of national identity in ballet, such as conferences, study days, articles and monographic dance seasons. Whether these initiatives are successful or not, it is difficult to say. Theatre dance is notoriously ephemeral, and any attempt to bring back the past is subject to different factors, such as the constant renewal of performance practices and the ever-changing taste of audiences.
What is certain is that the boundary between careful preservation and sheer nostalgia is a dangerously blurred and thin one, as demonstrated by the triple bill of essentially English ballets presented by Birmingham Royal Ballet last week at Sadler’s Wells.
Although each of the three works, Kenneth MacMillan’s Solitaire (1956), Ninette de Valois’s Checkmate (1937) and John Cranko’s Lady and the Fool (1954), resonated choreographically with the freshness that characterises any immortal masterwork, they all lacked the theatrical drive they once had. In my view, the problem stemmed mainly from the dancers’ approach to the revered choreographic texts. Birmingham Royal Ballet is a strong company, with a good number of fine artists. But it is also a predominantly ‘young’ one. As such, its dancers require special coaching to come to grips with choreographic styles and modes from the past. Unlike most 19th-century classics, such as Swan Lake or Sleeping Beauty, works such as the ones in this programme cannot be danced in line with the latest stylistic and technical trends. Nor can they come across fully with only a competent execution of the given steps.
I am not blaming the dancers, though, for they do what they are taught to do. Indeed, some of them respond naturally better than others to those instructions, as in the case of Robert Parker and Kosuke Yamamoto, who gave an absolutely perfect and moving reading of Moondog and Bootface, respectively, in Lady and the Fool. Yet I am sure that other dancers, too, would have stood a better chance had they been provided with the necessary tools to understand the subtleties of each work.
In the words of its creator, MacMillan, Solitaire was intended as ‘a kind of game for one’. Yet, beyond its playfulness, the work presents darker tones, for, in the end, its protagonist, a young girl, finds herself alone and abandoned by the jolly gang of playmates she has tried more or less successfully to mix with. Indeed, loneliness and being an outcast were distinctive traits of MacMillan’s production, a factor that cannot be overlooked. Despite some excellent dancing by Carol-Anne Millar, Viktoria Walton and Kosuke Yamamoto, what I saw unfortunately came across as just a ‘pretty’ ballet which overindulged in a sugary display of pseudo-childlike naivety, with no subtext whatsoever. Similarly, Checkmate, De Valois’s foray into Expressionism, lacked the interpretative chiaroscuro required to reach its climactic ending. Neither the inner struggle of the Red Knight, nor the devilishly seductive voluptuousness of his executioner, the Black Queen, came across fully. Nao Sakuma danced technically well as the latter, but did not ooze the villainous feelings the role needs.
As I have said, Cranko’s Lady and the Fool stood out for the now comic, now moving interpretation of Parker and Mamamoto. It is a pity, however, that the rest of the cast were not up to scratch. Elisha Willis, as the whimsical female lead, La Capricciosa, lacked the diva grandeur the role calls for. As for the others, the portrayal of stock characters, such as the dashing military guy, Capitano Adoncino, the exceedingly wealthy host, Signor Midas, and the frozen-hearted lady-killer aristocrat, the Prince of Arroganza, suffered from excessive caricature, instead of displaying Cranko’s refined balletic satire. The action, moreover, did not benefit from the exceedingly garish and inappropriate new sets and costumes by Kate Ford.
All in all, this programme could be a splendid way to introduce new generations of dance-goers to the artistic tenets of a truly glorious past. Alas, as it stands, it is more of a soppy and somewhat self-indulgent walk down memory lane.
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