Royal Ballet (live broadcast), 15/10/2018
Liszt (arr. Lanchberry) : Mayerling
The Royal Ballet
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Koen Kessels
Tackling the murder-suicide of Crown Prince Rudolf and his teenage mistress Mary Vetsera, at the hunting lodge of Mayerling, in January 1889, was always going to be an ambitious project, and if he was going to make a full-length ballet of it, Kenneth MacMillan knew he needed a good deal more to the story than just that admittedly very dramatic conclusion. In addition, he was faced with creating a substantial piece of work around a character who does not seem to have much to endear him to an audience. Rudolf, by the end of his life, was an alcoholic, syphilitic drug-addict, prone to paranoid delusions - not very promising material from which to craft a hero, one might think. That, of course, was probably a large part of the appeal for MacMillan, whose ability to psycho-analyse his characters in dance was unparalleled, and the more complex, the better, as far as he was concerned.
What emerged was possibly the most demanding male lead role in British ballet, and maybe in ballet anywhere to date. Yet Mayerling is also a 'company' piece, with significant crowd-scenes beginning each act, and a plethora of individual roles, from the five women with whom we see Rudolf primarily interact, to the numerous small parts, brief but strongly characterised, members and staff of Rudolf's entourage, or of the Imperial Court in general. At the heart of it, however, you need an actor/dancer with inexhaustible reserves, as he goes through pas de deux after pas de deux, each one more complex and arduous than the last, in the trajectory of his progressive disintegration.
This was exactly what we got tonight with Steven McRae. Always notable for his boundless verve, and the crisp precision of his dancing, he demonstrated here that he could turn all that to considerable dramatic use. It's more than a little tempting to make comparisons to Hamlet, particularly as Rudolf spends a certain amount of time mooning over a skull, and McRae was suitably pale and melancholy, but the tensions devouring the character from within were gradually and skilfully revealed, rising to the surface in scene after scene. The last duet was remarkable, because he gave the clear impression of a man whose limbs felt leaden, to whom movement was a terrible chore, and who could yet deliver explosive bursts of energy. The final pas de deux with Mary appeared to be painful in just the right sense, McRae managing to make it look simultaneously easy and almost impossibly difficult.
His partnership with Sarah Lamb is now one of long standing, they are a particularly well matched pair, and it was she who was dancing Mary Vetsera tonight. Her line is beautiful, cool and clear, her body expressive, and the chemistry between them is very powerful. The passion and the lust were there, undoubtedly, yet I found myself missing just that little grain de folie, the something extra in Mary, the wildness and danger that provides the last wee push to Rudolf. There was just a little too much compassion in her approach to Rudolf, I felt. Laura Morera, on the other hand, judged the progression of her Countess Larisch beautifully, starting out as a scheming adventuress, but evolving gradually into regretful, but genuine care for her damaged former lover, and this made the brief, fierce confrontation with Kristen McNally's Empress Elisabeth all the more telling. This was an elegantly danced and finely acted performance from Morera, one of the best things I have ever seen her do.
McNally, Meaghan Grace Hinkis (Rudolf's unfortunate young wife, Stephanie) and Mayara Magri (Rudolf's mistress Mitzi Caspar) all gave excellent performances too, though none quite on the same intense level as Lamb or Morera, while James Hay dazzled briefly as Bratfisch, particularly in the Act 3 solo. The company as a whole looked on good form, the crowd scenes well handled, although the opening procession into the ballroom went by at quite a clip! Not the corps's fault, however, that was the result of the tempo chosen by Koen Kessels for that particular sequence, and that was about the only fault I could find with the orchestra tonight, whose playing was exceptional, and really did remarkable justice to John Lanchberry's inspired patchwork of Liszt's music. I have to say that I find the sets more than a little dingy, and certainly far too dark, even in the cinema showing, but otherwise this was a very fine season opener, and a magnificent performance from Steven McRae.
[Next : 18th October]
The Royal Ballet
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Koen Kessels
Tackling the murder-suicide of Crown Prince Rudolf and his teenage mistress Mary Vetsera, at the hunting lodge of Mayerling, in January 1889, was always going to be an ambitious project, and if he was going to make a full-length ballet of it, Kenneth MacMillan knew he needed a good deal more to the story than just that admittedly very dramatic conclusion. In addition, he was faced with creating a substantial piece of work around a character who does not seem to have much to endear him to an audience. Rudolf, by the end of his life, was an alcoholic, syphilitic drug-addict, prone to paranoid delusions - not very promising material from which to craft a hero, one might think. That, of course, was probably a large part of the appeal for MacMillan, whose ability to psycho-analyse his characters in dance was unparalleled, and the more complex, the better, as far as he was concerned.
What emerged was possibly the most demanding male lead role in British ballet, and maybe in ballet anywhere to date. Yet Mayerling is also a 'company' piece, with significant crowd-scenes beginning each act, and a plethora of individual roles, from the five women with whom we see Rudolf primarily interact, to the numerous small parts, brief but strongly characterised, members and staff of Rudolf's entourage, or of the Imperial Court in general. At the heart of it, however, you need an actor/dancer with inexhaustible reserves, as he goes through pas de deux after pas de deux, each one more complex and arduous than the last, in the trajectory of his progressive disintegration.
This was exactly what we got tonight with Steven McRae. Always notable for his boundless verve, and the crisp precision of his dancing, he demonstrated here that he could turn all that to considerable dramatic use. It's more than a little tempting to make comparisons to Hamlet, particularly as Rudolf spends a certain amount of time mooning over a skull, and McRae was suitably pale and melancholy, but the tensions devouring the character from within were gradually and skilfully revealed, rising to the surface in scene after scene. The last duet was remarkable, because he gave the clear impression of a man whose limbs felt leaden, to whom movement was a terrible chore, and who could yet deliver explosive bursts of energy. The final pas de deux with Mary appeared to be painful in just the right sense, McRae managing to make it look simultaneously easy and almost impossibly difficult.
His partnership with Sarah Lamb is now one of long standing, they are a particularly well matched pair, and it was she who was dancing Mary Vetsera tonight. Her line is beautiful, cool and clear, her body expressive, and the chemistry between them is very powerful. The passion and the lust were there, undoubtedly, yet I found myself missing just that little grain de folie, the something extra in Mary, the wildness and danger that provides the last wee push to Rudolf. There was just a little too much compassion in her approach to Rudolf, I felt. Laura Morera, on the other hand, judged the progression of her Countess Larisch beautifully, starting out as a scheming adventuress, but evolving gradually into regretful, but genuine care for her damaged former lover, and this made the brief, fierce confrontation with Kristen McNally's Empress Elisabeth all the more telling. This was an elegantly danced and finely acted performance from Morera, one of the best things I have ever seen her do.
McNally, Meaghan Grace Hinkis (Rudolf's unfortunate young wife, Stephanie) and Mayara Magri (Rudolf's mistress Mitzi Caspar) all gave excellent performances too, though none quite on the same intense level as Lamb or Morera, while James Hay dazzled briefly as Bratfisch, particularly in the Act 3 solo. The company as a whole looked on good form, the crowd scenes well handled, although the opening procession into the ballroom went by at quite a clip! Not the corps's fault, however, that was the result of the tempo chosen by Koen Kessels for that particular sequence, and that was about the only fault I could find with the orchestra tonight, whose playing was exceptional, and really did remarkable justice to John Lanchberry's inspired patchwork of Liszt's music. I have to say that I find the sets more than a little dingy, and certainly far too dark, even in the cinema showing, but otherwise this was a very fine season opener, and a magnificent performance from Steven McRae.
[Next : 18th October]