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Odyssey

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  1. Odyssey
    I managed to catch most of this in-between entertaining my mother-in-law. It is always lovely to get behind-the-scenes footage at the Royal Ballet and glimpses of the interaction between members of the company. As grateful as we must be for the crumbs from the table of BBC Christmas schedules, I was left thinking that the commissioning of a one-off documentary was a lost opportunity for a mini-series in the period leading up to Christmas surrounding different aspects of staging the Nutcracker with the final episode preluding a screening of the ballet. Following this chain of thought, I started to ponder when was the last time the BBC made an in-depth series, in the mould of The Magic of Dance, Dancer, Ballerina, which largely featured classical dance?
  2. Odyssey
    You are most likely right . I seem to remember seeing a televised performance of her in Apollo, but this may have been Channel 4 or an extract on the South Bank Show.
  3. Odyssey
    "I don’t think much has been said of Christopher Wheeldon in the discussion on the dearth of successful narrative ballets to date. I would just say how much I have enjoyed Alice and Winter’s Tale and think these excellent narrative ballets, with memorable productions and performances by the Royal Ballet." I agree. For me the immediate future of the narrative ballet, as far as the Royal Ballet is concerned, rests with Wheeldon.
  4. Odyssey
    I was pleasantly surprised by the Darcey Bussell programme last night - so many clips without intrusive commentary. As others have said, a glimpse of the treasures in the BBC archives. I was fortunate enough to see Darcey a couple of times, most memorably in Prince of the Pagodas. Macmillan's comment about her being unlike an English dancer in her attack as well as her physique was so apparent at the time of her rise to fame, perhaps less so now. I loved the clip from Cinderella - I think her sunny personality perfectly suited the role. Surprised there wasn't a little more made of her excelling in Balanchine works and her success in America - although the extract from the Tchaikovsky pas de deux did illustrate this to some extent. This, combined with the clips, promises well for the Nutcracker documentary tomorrow.
  5. Odyssey
    Yes you are right cavycapers - the director is responsible for most of these aspects. In terms of presentation, the seemingly endless walking around significant landscapes, sometimes tenuously, connected to the subject matter is like a rash across documentary programmes. (There's a three-part one on Vienna at the moment that springs to mind). I would like to think the Darcey has a little more control over content . Perhaps if we saw the rushes of the various interviews, her questions may have been more probing, following through on the comments made, and that these were edited out. The lack of footage of Fonteyn dancing at the expense of "location walking and talking" was inexcusable whoever the programme was aimed at. As has been noted earlier, we needed to see some of her attributes followed through in visual terms. Such amplification would have served both those with a passing interest in ballet and those of us who might be mistakenly termed as 'elitist'.
  6. Odyssey
    It was, as some here predicted, a re-hash of documentaries about Fonteyn that have been aired previously ( and have been done better). There was a lot of walking around by Darcey, looking very chic in many different outfits, visiting some rather handsome locations and reading extracts from Fonteyn's autobiography - at times reminiscent of Michael Portillo's Bradshaw railway series. There was also some unnecessary sequences of Darcy coaching and talking to Kevin O'Hare and Laura Cuthbertson about what the name Fonteyn means to them. On the positive side it was lovely to see an interview with Beryl Grey and the detailed diaries kept by Fonteyn's mother. I must have nodded off and will have to catch up on the final ten minutes as I suddenly found myself watching Lucy Worsley's series on the Six Wives of Henry VIII. Not a good start to the festive offerings.
  7. Odyssey
    I really enjoyed the Ed Watson episode of Private Passions - a lovely choice of music and such a modest and thoughtful person. Well worth a listen.
  8. Odyssey
    Love it! I really think the feathers arm wings could work in Swan Lake perhaps Liam Scarlett might consider the possibility
  9. Odyssey
    The listing stated it was from 2014.Lovely to have another filmed performance of this wonderful production, but just like the BRB version many years ago, it is very dark in parts of Act 1 so the transformation of the Christmas tree and Clara dancing with the Prince is barely viewable. I noted that Australian ballet were very economical with the snow - Thete's positively a blizzard when BRB perform it. Also the choir were very restrained.
  10. Odyssey
    Details of this lovely annual event can be found here. It is a later date in the calendar than has been in the past. https://www.thsh.co.uk/event/an-evening-of-music-and-dance-with-birmingham-royal-ballet
  11. Odyssey
    Looking at Olivia's tweets the extent of the response suggests she could do with some santa's little helpers - well done to her for taking this on.
  12. Odyssey
    Yes, sadly the sold out sign went up within a few hours - is this a venture that might be repeated from time to tim as it would appear it could garner some much needed funds for charitable organisations?
  13. Odyssey
    There's als the Peter Wright documentary interview on 27th December BBC4 7pm
  14. Odyssey
    I just caught a few seconds preview of the Sir Peter Wright doc. as part of a montage of forthcoming programmes on BBC 4. It was a clip from the RB production including the curtain call which appeared to show Francesca in the Sugar Plum fairy costume ( the wig is always off putting). If the BBC has gone to the trouble and expense of filming these sequences,setting the lighting and camera positions etc, surely it follows that it is cost effective to have filmed/edited the whole production for a future transmission. Or am I being blissfully ignorant of the economics/politics of broadcasting performances?
  15. Odyssey
    Hi Janet, I was at the afternoon matinee on Tuesday too and agree it was a lovely performance. I haven't seen this production for a few years after seeing it for the first ten years when it entered the repertoire, and it has lost none of its power to create a truly wonderful theatrical experience. Yes it is the emergence of the Rat King from the glowing fireplace which combines so wonderfully with the triumphant flourish of the music and ensures the transformation scene culminates in such a thrilling manner. Other gems from this wonderful production I enjoyed rediscovering include the magnificen red dress that Clara's mother wears, the rat that Drosselmeyer's assistant fails to capture and escapes up the staircase, the twilight glow of the snowflake scene & the goose that transports Clara ... And that's just the first act. Laura Day was a lovely Clara and Tzu Chao Chou, who has a fine jump, made a strong and attentive Prince who projects a genuine sense of enjoying dancing. Samara Downs made an effective Rose fairy and Lachlan Monaghan caught my eye in the role of Clara's dancing partner.
  16. Odyssey
    I had to miss the screening last night and am disappointed to discover how few of my local cinemas in the Midlands are showing the encore . The one near me in an arts centre is a complete sellout. Still, I had the pleasure of a BRB performance on Tuesday which was a delight.
  17. Odyssey
    Overall I enjoyed this account of Sir Peter's life in dance. Yes it needed a firm edit but I found many of his assessments refreshingly honest. He may not be right on all counts and I can imagine he has ruffled more than a few feathers in the way he has chosen to comment on events and revered figures from the ballet world but my overall impression was his respect and admiration for the people he has worked with. There are relatively few comprehensive recent published accounts about working within the Royal Ballet or the Birmingham Royal Ballet so this in itself makes the volume a welcome read . Although I have to admit to the guilty pleasure of lapping up his anecdotes which at times come across as a gossipy chat behind closed doors, his observations about life on tour shine a light on the pressures and constraints that touring places on the whole company. One example would be his description of Doreen Wells valiantly dancing Aurora outdoors in the South of France when the evening dew made the stage steadily more hazardous as the evening wore on, with an audience oblivious to the problem starting to laugh as she began to "fall about". It is interesting to hear that there will be a revised paperback version. I hope it doesn't become so sanatised that the spirit of the original is lost.
  18. Odyssey
    Yes I think she was Clara. Irek Mukhamedov guested as the Prince and Miyako Yoshida was the Sugar Plum Fairy. Edited to add I hang on to my video - so many wonderful (if grainy) productions and documentaries that have disappeared from general viewing.
  19. Odyssey
    I have a video of it - perhaps I had better look after it!
  20. Odyssey
    It's good to see the BBC celebrating Sir Peter Wright's special birthday and the seasonal Nutcraker with new documentaries. Whereas Sky Arts can only muster the occasional ballet themed day repeatedly screening a small selection of performances. If th BBC show a performance of Nutcracker at Christmas, I would love to see a screening of the BRB version for a change -easily superior to Wright's Covent Garden production. There was a recording made of a performance many years ago and it made it to DVD so it must be possible to screen it again.
  21. Odyssey
    I assume most people here know that you can see Durante & Sansom in the act 2 pas de deux on You Tube as part of a gala performance. What I find most noticeable about this version is that it is danced at a faster pace. Viviana's fluidity and wonderful epaulement shines through. Both dancers were slighter in stature, but I agree with Floss that this is not the main cause of being underwhelmed by the performance on Wednesday evening..
  22. Odyssey
    I watched the tv showing having previously seen it at the cinema relay. I have to thank the BBC for the sceening - an interesting and imaginative programming for Halloween. However, if they are trying to grow an audience for classical ballet, they did not help by refraining from any synopsis which was particularly needed in the latter acts. The introduction was an edited composite version of the cinema screening which was fine, but then nothing followed to provide a context to how Scarlett has staged the narrative, It was good to remind myself of how well the creature works in this production and is brilliantly portrayed by Steven McRae. it is worth watching for this alone.
  23. Odyssey
    Thank you for posting this. The Birmingham Hippodrome has a long and varied history of bringing dance to the Midlands. A few years prior to the arrival of Sadler Wells who became BRB, I can remember being taken to see a Hungarian dance troupe there and being thrilled by the energy and power of their performance.
  24. Odyssey
    I am glad that Floss introduced Lynn Seymour's name to this thread . When I was growing up, she was the dancer who was frequently associated with the term 'dance actress'. I never saw her dance, but if you read her autobiography where she recollects creating Juliet with Macmillan, this is very much an actress as well as a dancer preparing the role. Her account of the point in the drama when having secretly married Romeo and forced by her family to wed Paris, Juliet has to decide what she should do is particularly revelatory. Macmillan suggested that he didn't want Juliet " prancing around the bedroom. ....could she just sit on the bed?" Lynn describes it as an audacious idea that could have easily been a disaster. "It required the careful building of a character whose desolation stirred the audience - without words, without movement". There are further accounts of the craft of building the dramatic characters that Macmillan created on her, but this one comes to my mind whenever I see this ballet and the passage is, for me ,very much a touchstone of how convincing I find the dancer in the role of Juliet. That ability to communicate what is going through this young girl's mind while she sits motionless on the edge of the bed and meanwhile the music soars. Magical.
  25. Odyssey
    It isn't easy to find but here is the email address : viewerR@sky.uk.
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