English National Ballet performances 2004-5

Stuart Sweeney · **Posted:** Fri Nov 12, 2004 7:37 am

Romeo and Juliet
Donald Hutera at the Palace Theatre, Manchester

A QUARTET of dice-throwing Fates exerts a parenthetical power in Rudolf Nureyev’s Romeo and Juliet. At English National Ballet, which presented its 308th performance of his production on Tuesday, the shots are called by a watchful board of governors.

The company should have opened its autumn season with Michael Corder’s new, full-length Les Liaisons Dangereuses. But English National Ballet is in belt-tightening mode so no gambling on big, untried ballets, the board has decreed. Les Liaisons Dangereuses, and even the company’s mid-scale touring programme, are temporarily on ice.

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[ 21 March 2005, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: Stuart Sweeney ]

kurinuku · **Posted:** Fri Nov 19, 2004 1:22 am

Quote:

Sunlight and star-cross'd lovers

by ISMENE BROWN
the Daily Telegraph

The dominance of MacMillan's passionate pair has swept most other Romeo and Juliets into unfair obscurity, so I am delighted to find Nureyev's extremely well-conceived version revived by English National Ballet this season.

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kurinuku · **Posted:** Thu Jan 13, 2005 3:27 am

Quote:

Romeo and Juliet

by JUDITH MACKRELL
the Guardian

Rudolf Nureyev may have famously danced the first performance of Kenneth MacMillan's Romeo and Juliet in 1966, but when he choreographed his own version a decade later he did everything he could to re-write that classic. As English National Ballet's revival shows, this is a ballet where Romeo unusually takes centre stage. From his first brazenly strutting solo to his last, egregiously muscular dance of grief, it's clear that the real love affair here is between the choreographer and his hero.

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kurinuku · **Posted:** Fri Jan 14, 2005 2:54 am

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Romeo and Juliet, Coliseum, London

by ZOE ANDERSON
the Indepepndent

English National Ballet's colourful Romeo and Juliet is a mixture of gusto and fuss. Rudolf Nureyev's production, created for this company in 1977, has been very popular. This revival has real sweep, with lively performances and splendid Renaissance designs. But the choreography has too many bright ideas, too much fiddly detail. It doesn't always leave room for the star-cross'd lovers.

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aferrovip · **Posted:** Sat Jan 15, 2005 2:57 am

Hello from Barcelona.
I know that a lot of months have passed but I can not forget the incredibly perfect performance of Agnes Oaks as Odette.
The English National ballet came to the Barcelona Opera house last april,and offered a mixed program.
They offered the 2nd act of Swan Lake, with Agnes Oaks as Odette. Simply , perfect.
I also enjoyed the performance of Maria Ribó Parés. She is a very tall dancer, and it was fantastic to see her in Swan lake. I had never seen a swan so tall¡¡¡ My friend next to me told me the same, and we agreed that the efect was fantastic, and we also agreed, : she is very elegant, look at the arms¡¡¡¡ I still remember Oaks, but curiously I still remember this dancer, Ribó, not only for Swan lake, also because she danced then on the 3rd act of the mixed program.I do not remember the name of the 3rd act, but it was with music of the 50's, and they were wearing clothes of those years. Ribó danced also very very well, and as she has very long legs , the dance of those wonderful coreographies of the 50's were really spectacular, and the audience was enchanted and she got a great success.

I wish they come back soon to Barcelona, and I wish I could see Swan Like but the entire ballet, not only the 2nd act. I'd be great to see Oaks dancing the 3rd act, her Odile must be spectacular¡¡¡

bye bye¡¡¡

kurinuku · **Posted:** Mon Jan 17, 2005 12:35 am

Quote:

Castanets at the ready, comrades

by JANN PARRY
the Observer

Ardent though Daria Klimentova and Dmitri Gruzdyev are as the doomed young lovers, the choreography scarcely lets them breathe. Tomboy Juliet hurtles about in steps Nureyev liked dancing himself, while Romeo has to accomplish every feat in the male dancer's lexicon.

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[ 17 January 2005, 01:37 AM: Message edited by: kurinuku ]

kurinuku · **Posted:** Mon Jan 17, 2005 1:37 am

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Unforgettable hurricane of passion

by ISMENE BROWN
the Daily Telegraph

...and the only pity is that Nureyev's hectic love duets for them are so lacking in intimacy. Top-speed energy and playfulness are fine to begin with, but by Act 3 one just wants them to stop dashing around and take a good long look into each other's eyes.

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[ 17 January 2005, 01:58 PM: Message edited by: Stuart Sweeney ]

Stuart Sweeney · **Posted:** Sat Jan 29, 2005 7:35 am

Romeo and Juliet
By Clifford Bishop for The Sunday Times

This is the act where we are finally spared Romeo’s elegant but narcissistic solos and the focus narrows, almost unbearably, on Juliet. Through a darkly fluent interleaving of the real and the fantastic — Death entering her bed and taking her virginity; the casually brutal way her parents dress her; a pas de trois with the ghosts of Tybalt and Mercutio, when she is debating whether to kill herself — we are infected with Juliet’s delirium and dragged into her private hell. When ENB brought its new revival of this production to the Coliseum, it laudably gave this most demanding role to the young Brazilian first soloist, Fernanda Oliveira.

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kurinuku · **Posted:** Thu Mar 17, 2005 7:01 am

Quote:

A maiden returns to her romantic roots

by ISMENE BROWN
the Daily Telegraph

ENB was suddenly looking - and sounding - like a quality company. Dame Beryl Grey, who as LFB's director commissioned this production, has been coaching. The corps, both as villagers or as Wilis, easily conjured up the communities of sunny reality and troubled darkness, ...

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kurinuku · **Posted:** Mon Mar 21, 2005 1:03 am

Quote:

Giselle

by JUDITH MACKRELL
the Guardian

But audiences familiar with the more red-blooded production staged by The Royal might find Skeaping's Giselle short on drama. The logic of her stage business, her grouping of the dancers has more to do with formal composition than action, which means that some of the big psychological moments get lost.

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Stuart Sweeney · **Posted:** Mon Mar 21, 2005 12:36 pm

Giselle
By David Dougill for The Sunday Times

English National Ballet has had to abandon new work for the past year (finance again) and retrench in the big classics. Last Tuesday saw a new revival at the Mayflower Theatre, Southampton, moving to Bristol this week, of the late Mary Skeaping’s 1971 production of Giselle. Daria Klimentova is sweet and shy in the title role, but there is nothing modest about her technique — fleet and gorgeously assured. However, she and her elegant Albrecht, Dmitri Gruzdyev, make less impact in the acting than in the dancing.

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Stuart Sweeney · **Posted:** Tue Mar 22, 2005 2:54 am

Giselle
By Donald Hutera for The Times

DAME ALICIA MARKOVA, who died in December aged 94, founded and presided over English National Ballet (ENB) for more than 50 years. How fitting a tribute for the company to revive Giselle, the ballet with which she was most associated.

Mary Skeaping also enjoyed a long attachment to Jean Coralli and Jules Perrot’s 1841 classic. Beginning in 1925 as a dancer in Anna Pavlova’s troupe, Skeaping went on to stage six versions of the ballet herself.

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Stuart Sweeney · **Posted:** Sat Apr 02, 2005 7:06 pm

I've shifted the discussion of Matz Skoog's resignation to our current ENB News topic:

http://forum.criticaldance.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=33;t=001025

[ 03 April 2005, 01:53 AM: Message edited by: Stuart Sweeney ]

Stuart Sweeney · **Posted:** Fri Jun 24, 2005 2:09 am

Romeo and Juliet
By Gavin Roebuck for The Stage

English National Ballet performs Derek Deane’s popular in the round production with a cast of over 120 dancers to bring this classic tale to life in a spectacular way. Making their British debuts in the titles roles are Alicia Amatriain and Friedemann Vogel, two superb dancers from the Stuttgart Ballet.

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Stuart Sweeney · **Posted:** Fri Jun 24, 2005 2:19 am

I've consolidated two topics:

Artists First
Friedemann Vogel and Alicia Amatriain will be guesting with ENB this season as Romeo and Juliet in the company’s in-the-round production. For Dancing Times Patricia Daly met them to find out more.

English National Ballet will be reviving Derek Deane’s 1998 production of Romeo and Juliet with designs by Roberta Guidi di Bagno at the Royal Albert Hall from June15-25. Conceived for an arena setting, the ballet will feature 120 dancers of an augmented English National Ballet. The opening night cast will be led by Alicia Amatriain and Friedemann Vogel, the London debut of these young, talented dancers from Stuttgart Ballet, who are making their mark on the international dance scene.

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A strong whiff of the piazza
by ISMENE BROWN for the Daily Telegraph

This summer it is Romeo and Juliet that occupies the arena. /.../ and does generate its own atmosphere, filling and fitting the Albert Hall. This is largely because Derek Deane, former ENB artistic director and conceiver of arena ballet, decided, instead of adapting existing choreography, to write his own, and though Deane is no great choreographer, he is a fine stage director.

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Romeo and Juliet, Royal Albert Hall, London
by CLEMENT CRISP for the Financial Times

But Derek Deane's "in the round" productions for English National Ballet of dance-spectacles with titles people know - Swan Lake (huge success), The Sleeping Beauty (rather less so), and the return this week of his Romeo and Juliet (a triumph) - are guaranteed to bring in an eager and receptive audience.

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English National Ballet performances 2004-5

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