Gounod's Faust is, on the one hand, a gift for directors and performers - as Geoff Brown says in The Times, "It’s a Cecil B De Mille film directed by Bob Fosse, and Hell on Earth in more ways than one" - but it can often inspire productions so over the top with racy ideas and cut-out villains that an audience couldn't care less about the characters on stage. David McVicar's … [Read more...] about Critics Round-up: the Royal Opera’s Faust
Financial Times
Critics Round-up: Royal Ballet in Jewels
This production opens Monica Mason's last season as director of the Royal Ballet. To recall the company as it was 10 years ago, after the dreadful year in which Ross Stretton’s directorship had reduced the troupe to a confused and uncertain state – the Queen’s Golden Jubilee gala remains a nightmare for those who sat incredulously through it – is to recognise how much Dame … [Read more...] about Critics Round-up: Royal Ballet in Jewels
Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, La Bayadère
Strangely, most critics didn't attend the Mariinsky's signature ballet La Bayadère, the sixth and last of their 2011 London season. Well, it was mid-August and the beaches were calling. However ballet stalwart Clement Crisp was still in the saddle, and gave this evening another 5-star review. If Mr Crisp is now on holiday he must have left London a very happy man … [Read more...] about Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, La Bayadère
Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Anna Karenina
The fifth offering from the Mariinsky divided the critics. Most had reserves over Alexei Ratmansky's storytelling, but even Kenneth MacMillan's Manon received a hammering on its first outing. The general consensus seemed to be interesting but not great, with some wonderful interpretations. The Telegraph thought that Ratmansky had set himself an impossible task, Nobody … [Read more...] about Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Anna Karenina
Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Scotch Symphony / Ballet Imperial / In The Night
The fourth Mariinsky programme to grace the Royal Opera stage was another triple bill: Scotch Symphony and Ballet Imperial by George Balanchine, and In The Night by Jerome Robbins. Although this was an evening of American choreography, New York City Ballet territory, the roots are here with this company. Balanchine, one of its favourite sons, and his disciple Robbins, built on … [Read more...] about Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Scotch Symphony / Ballet Imperial / In The Night
Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Don Quixote
The third ballet programme brought to London by the Marrinsky Ballet was Don Quixote, the perennial crowd-pleaser with which the Bolshoi scored such a success a year ago. Strangely only two days of their three-week stay was devoted to this classic, but they scored another hit nevertheless. As The Times noted, What a shame there were just two performances of this greatest of … [Read more...] about Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Don Quixote
Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Swan Lake
The Mariinsky kicked off their 3-week stay at the Royal Opera House with Swan Lake. An obvious, and right, choice, Immutable is the Mariinsky’s root foundation in classical tradition. Everything they dance speaks of “schooling”. Whatever more modern works the repertory now embraces, the classic ballets provide the company’s signature — none more so in the avid public’s mind … [Read more...] about Critics round-up: Mariinsky at Covent Garden, Swan Lake
The FT gives a one-star review and a thumbs-down to Acosta and Yanowsky
In one of the worst reviews of the season, the Financial Times' Clement Crisp finds almost nothing to like in Carlos Acosta's Premieres Plus at the London Coliseum: I remember visiting East Berlin when that city was still divided, and being intrigued by shops whose windows were filled with boxes which proclaimed delicacies of many kinds. A friend explained that the boxes, … [Read more...] about The FT gives a one-star review and a thumbs-down to Acosta and Yanowsky
Critics’ Roundup: the Mariinsky in London, Swan Lake
In a splattering of mainly four and five-star reviews it was, perhaps surprisingly, the Financial Times's Clement Crisp, maybe the hardest critic to please, who showered compliments over the company without restraint: The world’s stages are littered with productions of Swan Lake, the majority of which – as I know to my cost – are horrid and foolishly optimistic. One alone I … [Read more...] about Critics’ Roundup: the Mariinsky in London, Swan Lake
Critics round-up: Romeo & Juliet… Osipova, Vasiliev, Lendorf & Ashton
Her Osipova's Juliet starts out as a hyper teenager, whirling on brilliantly fast feet. There's an immediate abandon to her dancing, movement sweeping through her small frame. As an actress, she doesn't always find the balance between this delicate choreography and her own huge personality. The Independent The limpid beauty of Osipova’s dancing — all languid limbs and … [Read more...] about Critics round-up: Romeo & Juliet… Osipova, Vasiliev, Lendorf & Ashton