Paul Arrowsmith

Only to add the reaction of an opera-going (ie not a regular dance-goer) freind with whom we saw the full-length Pagodas in 1996 - and who has now seen the streamlined production. Then, not appreciating the structure and conventions of full-length classical ballet, he found Pagodas long and lacking momentum. Now, Pagodas appeared more dramatically convincing.

All credit to Birmingham Royal Ballet, particularly its corps. Absent for around a decade, David Bintley’s Far from the madding crowd emerged for just a handful of performances looking fresh, danced with precision and energy. Much as I love Thomas Hardy’s novels I do find his yokels a trial. They are ever present in Bintley too, first cousins to Massine’s eccentrics, always eager to indulge in another jolly knees up. The tangle of Bathsheba and the three men in her life is compressed into short sections, which has the impact of making the story more melodramatic than it really is. But cleverly Bintley runs different threads together. Fanny Robin’s collapse is juxtaposed with the harvest storm. At the circus, unseen by them, we see Troy’s reaction to discovering Bathsheba and Boldwood together. But too often the danced set pieces – the wedding party, the harvest supper, the Dick Turpin spoof – dominate at the expense of the characters. Hard to see much character in Elisha Willis’ Bathsheba – but perhaps that is the point. She could be anything that her suitors wanted her to be. Of these, Iain Mackay gave real depth to Troy, making him more than the shallow charlatan he is. If I were Kevin O’Hare I would be casting Mackay as Onegin and in Mayerling next season, such was the dramatic force of his acting and dancing. In comparison, the other men made less impression. Matthew Lawrence was a subtle, troubled Boldwood but Joseph Caley was a laddish Oak, too young to have the moral weight that Hardy depicts. I am not convinced by the framing device of Bathsheba and Oak, where first he is rejected then later accepted by her. The effect was sentimental. Carol-Anne Millar was luxury casting as the euphemistically labelled “garrison woman,” skilfully manipulated by William Bracewell and Feargus Campbell.

Sad news. John Percival was part of my growing up and education. In the mid-1970s before I saw much dance I recall reading John Percival's reviews in The Times - always an informed and informative counterpoint to the reviews in The Guradian by Mary Clarke and Clement Crisp in The FT. His insights were valuable and will be missed.

More to the point - he will be missed, a performer with personality and presence - as the blue boy, a Hungarian - but also in a more natural role in Dances at a Gathering.

Hmmm... It's not the best start to a novel is it! I've skipped those nine pages and more. Not grabbed yet on this reread!

This revised Pagodas is a curate's egg, notable for some performances but questionable theatrically. Sarah Lamb was a lovely Rose, dancing with a dreamy creaminess - her manner and personality less brittle than we normally see from her. Her rippling arms and buoyant jump were a delight. Federico Bonelli was a conventional princely blank. His (new) first entrance, wandering in from behind a castle, does nothing to anticipate the title character. But as the salamander, Bonelli conveyed pain and frustration in his lizard skin. His tears flowing under the reptilian skull-cap were palpable. Laura Morera was a vivid Epine, lusciously wicked. Pleasures too in supporting roles - Brian Maloney as an insinuatingly physical king of the south, Johannes Stepanek as a camply narcissistic king of the east. Cleanly danced without being an all-out virtuoso Valentino Zuchetti injected pathos into the fool, very much in the manner of how the jester in Cinderella used to be danced. There is precious little for the rest of the company to do in how the ballet has been pruned and rearranged. Casting first soloists as the counsellor, a doctor and in the pas d'action is a waste of their talents. But the ballet has been deliberately reshaped to be dramatically more coherent - rather than as a vehicle to provide opportunities at all levels of the company. Overlong as I previously found them, I do miss the clouds and winds from the second act. They were inessential to MacMillan's treatment of the story (though not in other choreogarphers' depiction of Rose's rite of passage in Pagodaland). MacMillan's divertissements did have some fiendishly difficult but exhilarating choreography - perfectly suited to a fairytale ballet and a classically based company. But what we have in this revival is a linear depiction of a girl's experiences and fantasies. We have lost the amibiguites that gave The Prince of the Pagodas such romantic suggestibility. The ballet has lost much of its resonance. Some elements of the staging do not make the effects they should. The reordering of action in the first act does not make the characters' behaviour any more rational. Epine's curse and the transformation of the prince does not register, it is over in an instant (this though is largely a musical problem but crisper timing with the lighting would help). The slow-motion assault by the king of the south on Rose in act two is undermined by relentessly flashing lighting that upstages the dancing. In the last act, Epine's final exit is no longer one final leap to freedom but what now appears to be her crushed between two castles - but there is so little lighting on her that the moment is invisible and has no dramatic impact. Listen to Oliver Knussen's recording of the complete score and the music emerges vibrantly full of instrumental colour. The slow tempi and emphatic weight with which the ROH orchestra play reveals the score as less interesting, in step with the neutered production of the ballet.

Not being a Friend I haven't been trying to book for period one, but what progress to be able to get in to the ROH site and check whatever else I needed, even on opera booking day.

Perhaps because the ballet is bigger than its leading roles. It works as a well crafted piece of theatre whoever is dancing.

The ROH period 1 brochure lists Rojo as a guest artist - and there are some Swan Lakes listed as tbc but with Acosta.

I have no desire to champion anyody here but am moved to observe that in comparison with The Royal Opera, the RB has allowed all manner of observations and, at best, half-truths to gain credence and multiply. Such insularity is damaging to the reputation of the RB and the career of Polunin. In comparison, Kasper Holten, the new, Danish (that is somebody with a perspective outside the ROH) director of The Royal Opera has been across the blogosphere to correct the many (possibly) erroneous comments about the high-level defections afflicting the casting of productions at the RO currently. Whether Holten's explanations are to be accepted at face value (many in the opera logosphere do not), he has been willing to champion publicly and virtually the RO's position. That displays to me (professionally a lifelong PR) a degree of connection with reality and with ROH audiences that is saluatory.

Yes. Very atmospheric photos. Sarah Lamb looks radiant - could this be a defining role for her?

Well it's not my favourite Hardy but I think that's because of the film version. Reading the synopsis of the ballet, it strikes me as a busy story. See you in Birmingham I hope.

Just returned to Far From The Madding Crowd - possibly a mistake to read it again before seeing Bintley's ballet later in the month, which will be new to me.

I think the inclusion of a pdd would have balanced the programme better and showed good faith with audiences (the length of intervals at the ROH is cynical in extreme) - but for me on this occasion (Saturday afternoon), Ballo della regina did not rush past in the same blur that it usually does (the music doesn't pause for breath). Rather from the performances of the ensemble and the four soloists there was lots of detail to appreciate that usually gets lost in the torrent. So 18 minutes was quite enough for me.

From casting on the ROH web - see Yanowsky is no longer listed as Epine.

Could anybody advise a detailed running time for this programme - particularly when does the first interval finish? Thanks.

I should add Pilcrow may not be everybody's cup of tea - it is the first in a trilogy (next is Cedilla, the third yet to be published) about a boy with Still's disease. He has fused hips and the narrative is his perceptions of the world - starting in the 1950s. It is deliberately slow - filled with the minutiae of existence - but beautifully written. Mars-Jones' lucid and quirky elegance reminds me of Alastair Macauley (sp?). I got the books (ex-library copies) very cheaply on AbeBooks.

Just read A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth and now on with Pilcrow by Adam Mars-Jones - both very well observed and written.

There are a lot of issues here. I think there is a difference between dancing style and performing style - and MacMillan is not the best point of reference for a consideration of Don Q. There is more to consider in Don Q than who dances Basilio. The RB in performance add a dimension to MacMillan that is not written into his choreography, but through constant exposure and experience of it the RB adds colour. I doubt that ability in Don Q - evidenced in part by their Bayadere, which never looks instinctive. The question of how well MacMilan constructs narrative is separate - I think. The only time (based on watching the RB comapnies since the mid-70s) I have understood the expressiveness of "English style" was during the Ashton centenary season, 2004-05. The way the RB moved then was full of personality, highly expressive, colourful and technically strong. A natural idiom had been rediscovered. I doubt that a work so far outside the RB's native perameters as Don Q will display the RB - and the choreography - to best advantage. Yes I hope that Acosta (should it be he) will inspire the RB to attack classical choreography with the fearlessness they display in McGregor. Might it not be more constructive use (for all) if McGregor - as resident choeographer - were to produce a future Don Q?

The RB's pedigree is in narrative ballets - the plot of Don Q is subservient to excuses for flamboyant dancing. There is a mis-match between the joie de danser that Don Q demands and the RB's naturallly reticient, rather colourless, performing style. I liked the Baryshnikov production in the early 1990s with its very stylish, theatrical designs - but the performances were several sizes too small - other than Mukhamedov who had the flair and power to play with the choreography.

Checkinh what is on is a different action to wanting to book. The number of clicks required is convoluted.

Utterly flummoxed - arrived on the new ROH home page and can see nothing that says "but now" - or anything obvious to guide you to booking tickets.

The Peacock theatre in London is not the most conspicuously sited - but you only had to follow the parade of mums with little girls in frilly pink dresses to find My First Sleeping Beauty. The staging uses Aurora's nurse as a narrator to guide us through the story, provide insights into ballet technique and (not so successfully) encourage some audience participation. At the performance I saw it was this narration where children's attention wandered most. The dancing commanded attention unaided. But Matthew Hart's version has some nice touches - and makes us reconsider the drama of the story. The lilac fairy performed 16 fouettes (we were invited to count along) to denote the years passing between the first two acts. Carabosse is a disguised knitting woman at the start of the second act - the inevitability of her course is made clearer. However, where the narration prefigured the action the response of the children in the audience was to lose interest in how the dance conveyed it. Mimed passages explained by the narrator nurse - both clearly expressed - was a case of information overload. Left to its own devices, the dance alone was sufficiently cptivating to engross the young audience. The power of Carabosse was genuinely scary. Indeed, children's powers of comprehension should not be underestimated. The tiny tot near me mainatained a running commentary: "that's the baddie" (the disguised Carabosse), "why doesn't the lilac fairy do something?" (before she did), "why are the all wearing the same dress?" (Aurora's friends - why do they?), "she might not like them" (Aurora's choice of the four princes). Is there a need for such a staging? I'm in two minds. My first ballet in this country was a schools' matinee of Coppelia by Sadler's Wells Royal Ballet, back in the 1970s (led by Murray Kilgour and Petal Miller). The preface to a performance of the complete ballet was an introduction to the work, its characters, ballet technique, staging and lighting methods, audience behaviour. It was well pitched, fun and informative - far more so than this First Sleeping Beauty - but would probably be judged too pedagogic these days. The need nowadays is for an experience. At the Peacock, it was an experience mainly for little girls who took every opportunity to waft their furry pink wands -and for one already socially competitive girl, a flashing perspex butterfly. Very few dads and boys were in the audience. Bad habits are formed young.

"Trouble is, people who break embargoes tend to put their future relationship with the press office in question at risk." ENB needs positive media coverage more than any journalist needs ENB. Embargoed releases are a complete no-no in PR in any age.

Beatriz Stix-Brunell was remarkably accomplished - but too much so for a character who is out of control in her mad surroundings? However immediate the slickness of the show is - the impression it creates fades as quickly as the heat from an electric fire.