First Look: Carlos Acosta’s Carmen for The Royal Ballet

It is 10.30pm in London, and the curtain has just gone down on The Royal Ballet’s new quadruple bill which includes Carlos Acosta’s new creation for the company: Carmen.

Here are the first images of the new production, hot off the press.

Carlos Acosta’s second choreographic creation for The Royal Ballet shares a Spanish theme but inhabits a very different world from his 2013 production of Don Quixote.

Combining traditional ballet styles with flamenco, contemporary and Cuban dance, Acosta’s Carmen distils the plot of the opera: it homes in on the dark love triangle between Carmen, Don José and Escamillo and focusses especially on Carmen herself.

‘I wanted to establish immediately who she really is’, says Acosta: ‘a force of persuasion, a force of seduction’.

Carmen – Carlos Acosta as Don José, Marianela Nuñez as Carmen – ©ROH. Photographed by Tristram Kenton

Carmen – Carlos Acosta as Don José, Marianela Nuñez as Carmen – ©ROH. Photographed by Tristram Kenton

The mixed programme of Viscera / Afternoon of a Faun / Tchaikovsky Pas de deux / Carmen runs 26 October–12 November 2015. Tickets are still available for some performances.

The programme will be broadcast live to cinemas around the world on 12 November 2015. Find your nearest cinema.