Article by:
Judith Mackrell
It’s 50 years since Kenneth MacMillan choreographed Romeo and Juliet, and in that time the ballet has become acknowledged as one of the great dance dramas of our time. But Shakespeare’s tragedy has proved wonderfully adaptable to dance of all genres, its drama of divided lovers – of youthful passion pitted against age and death – has been vividly embodied in hip-hop, jazz and a whole gamut of contemporary styles. This week, as MacMillan’s ballet plays on the main stage of the Opera House, the theatre’s Linbury Studio is presenting another, very different Romeo and Juliet: Symphonie Dramatique by the Canadian company Cas Public.
Choreographed by the company’s founder, Hélène Blackburn, this is a production that advertises its style credentials from the start, as its eight performers hurtle through a manically compressed account of the star-cross’d lovers. Sections of Shakespeare’s text are either spoken out loud or projected on to the stage (frequently in an attention-seeking variety of fonts). Chunks of Prokofiev’s ballet score (voguishly looped and layered with snippets of other music) act as narrative signposts, while the choreography swerves between fights, agitated love duets, crowd scenes and a schematic death or two.
Some of the movement is clipped and minimalist; some veers into fast, propulsive ballet (Blackburn seems much influenced by fellow Canadian Édouard Lock) and the cumulative effect is super-slick. The stage teems with sharply etched dance patterns, executed with a fierce efficiency; the lighting is cool, and I love the giant industrial chandelier that dominates the space. Yet as impressively styled as this work is, I struggle to see beyond its shiny, knowingly meta surface. This is a Romeo and Juliet so rigorously deconstructed, so mashed and warped, that all the emotional life has been wrung from it.
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