Review: The Trocks in London with Olga Supphozova taking her final bows
Jonathan Gray has been admiring Robert Carter’s dancing for over 30 years, now on his last tour with The Trocks, who were “a delight from start to finish”.
| Title | Mixed Bill: Le Lac des cygnes (Swan Lake, Act II), Le Corsaire pas de deux, Metal Garden, The Dying Swan, Paquita |
| Company | Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo (The Trocks) |
| Venue | Sadler’s Wells, London |
| Date | 5 May 2026 |
| Reviewer | Jonathan Gray |
There can be many forms of humour in the theatre: subversive, irreverent, naughty, knowing, informed, affectionate, ironic, belly-laugh-out-loud, and humour that can charm and enchant. All these qualities – and more – are found in abundance in a performance by Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, the New York-based all-male drag ballet company affectionately known to all as “The Trocks”. Only the most po-faced balletomane could fail to respond to their engaging slapstick, so it was a special pleasure to welcome The Trocks back to the UK last night for a 50th-anniversary tour. They were appearing for the very first time at Sadler’s Wells (about time, too) in a mixed bill of favourites from the classical ballet repertoire.
The one form of humour in which The Trocks never indulge is that which is spiteful, and so the audience knows that although the company is parodying such sacred choreographic texts as Act II of Swan Lake or Giselle, they are send-ups that come from a place of affection and respect, not hatred. Although Swan Lake‘s Prince Siegfried is a peroxide-blond himbo, the evil magician Von Rothbart takes a breather from energetically running around the stage and triggering too much lightening, the Swan Queen is an attention-seeking diva, and the flock (gang?) of swans are a corps de ballet you really wouldn’t want to mess with, the choreography they perform is firmly based on the 1895 original by Lev Ivanov.
There are pratfalls galore, as well as some sharply observed gags based on some of ballet’s most absurd mannerisms and foibles, but goodness, their dancing is marvellous and funny. Who wouldn’t want to have a pair of long, elegant legs and pointed feet like those of Araf Legupski (Andrea Fabbri) as Siegfried, or deploy the sheer musicality and intricate entrechats six of the Odette of Colette Adae (Jake Spearman)?
After the interval came a selection of shorter works. The famous pas de deux from Le Corsaire was performed almost “straight” by the diminutive Maya Thickenthighya (Peter Gwiazda) and Mikhail Mudkin (Raydel Caceres), complete with speedy pirouettes and fouettés, and this was followed by the British premiere of Seán Curran’s Metal Garden. Created especially for The Trocks in 2024, the work is a delicious spoof of one of those modern-day neo-classical ballets you see in New York rather than London, all jigging lines and patterns, and looping limbs for the cast to step through and around, danced in a mish-mash of saggy dance wear and fright wigs.
Bringing the central section of the programme to a close was The Dying Swan, complete with moulting feathers and deliberately indulgent curtain calls, performed by the much-loved Olga Supphozova (Robert Carter). Carter is a naturally gifted comic performer, as well as a wonderful dancer, who moves with exquisite bourrées, beautiful, rippling arms, delicate fingers and an expressive face, and his performance was made even more poignant because he is due to retire from the stage at the end of The Trocks’ UK tour. I’ve been watching him perform and admiring his dancing for over 30 years, and he will be greatly missed.
Robert Carter (aka Olga Supphozova and Yuri Smirnov)
To end the evening was a cracking account of the Grand Pas from Paquita, choreographed by Marius Petipa, in which the company excel. Danced with the kind of relish, attention to style and detail, and pure, jokey bravura, it was a delight from start to finish. There were gorgeous accounts of the five ballerina solos by Tatiana Youbetyabootskaya (Andrea Fabbri), Moussia Shebarkarova (Vincent Brewer), Minnie Van Driver (Liam Hutt), Gerd Törd (Matias Dominguez-Escrig) and Colette Adae, and an astonishing array of spectacular pirouettes and fouettés from the Paquita of Varvara Laptopova (Tataomi Yoshino), who performs like a true ballerina. The announcement at the beginning of the evening proved to be true: “All our ballerinas are in very, very good moods.”
At the curtain calls, the audience whooped and cheered, the dancers clapped and waved back, and then broke into a Riverdance-style encore to make us laugh once more and send us home even happier.
The UK tour continues until 24 June 2026
