According to an item that has appeared on the French Website "Dansomanie",

this weekend,

Emmanuel Thibault will make his début as Prince Désiré, in The Sleeping Beauty, with the Inoue Ballet.

The Sleeping Beauty (prologue and 3 Acts)
at U-port Kan-ï Hoken Hall, Tokyo
on July 21st (18h00) and 22nd (15h00) juillet 2007

Princess Aurora: Kinuko Shimada (21/07), Naoko Fujii (22/07)
Prince Désiré: Emmanuel Thibault

Ticket price: S- 9,000yen, A- 7,000yen, B- 5,000yen, C- 3,000yen

http://inoue.ballet.ne.jp/index.html.

contact: mail@inoue.ballet.ne.jp

Inoue Ballet has invited a number of Paris Opera stars, including Cyril Athanassof. M. Thibault's Aurora on July 21st, Kinuko Shimada, is a former apprentice with the Royal Ballet at Copenhagen.

I would be exceptionally gratefully to anyone in Japan who is able to post a comment, personal view or photograph of these performances.

Many thanks.

Cassandra

I second that request.

A review of this July performance at Tokyo with the Inoue Ballet Foundation has just appeared in the October 2007 of Dance Europe (London), by Yuki Nagano, in English.

"A performance of note in Tokyo, in late July, was the first Prince Désiré by Emmanuel Thibault.

"(...) It is thoroughly understandable that this quiet danseur noble decided to seize the opportunity, and the result was triumphant.

"(...) the Vision Scene provided a suitable platform for Thibault's typical romanticism. His longing for Aurora is intensely expressed by his back, with an ecstatic yet academically polished arch, as well as arms yearningly stretched towards the ethereal princess (...) . Although the small stage did not allow him to tour across with full-scale leaps, each movement of his limbs and head from one position to another is smooth, precise and rich in subtleties.

"In the final act, in contrast, he has proven his quality as a classicist. When he puts his feet in a perfect fifth position and opens his arms upwards, it is an act of realising the idea of proportion and harmony within the living human body. It is quite rare that a dancer can radiate this dignity without sacrificing a bit of his innate freshness and calm."