Indigo

Excellent - I shall look out for that, thank you. I knew there were admirers of Vadim's hair being 'floppy' but hadn't spotted that!

I'm enjoying this thread & have to put in a special word for Vadim Muntagirov's hair. His hair is normally is a flowing extension of his dancing as in movement, it adds to the effect of graceful elegance in my opinion. But that's not all. His hair can Act ! As Albrecht is forced to continue dancing by Myrtha in Act II & comes dangerously close to death, Vadim's hair reflects that level of sheer exhaustion & despair by breaking free of its restraining hair products & forming desperate clumps of anguish. Then angles of wretchedness as dawn breaks & Albrecht faces life without Giselle. Kudos.

I'd love to have seen that, Aileen & Alison! Southampton isn't that far away from me, either. I'd also love to have seen Vadim & Daria dance together in any ballet, but I was still in the early stages of getting into ballet when she retired & I had no idea what I'd been missing until it was too late

You may be onto something there! At the ROH last night Hilarion's boots were only knee high & no shorts, just tights. It looked like a kind of animal-skin top, with a white linen-style shirt underneath. (Hope I've got that right). Vadim & Marianela's performance last night was just sublime. Fully agree with Simon & Balletfanp. Me too. I don't know how it is, as Vadim's dancing has always had the ability to move me tremendously. But as Albrecht, he's out of this world. When in combination with Marianela in Giselle, my soul just soars. A fabulous evening & all the cast contributed to it's success. I especially enjoyed the pas de six & the part where Yasmine & Francesca dance together was just wonderful again, as were all the Wilis. As I walked back across Waterloo bridge, Big Ben was chiming 10 o'clock & in the dank gloom, I half-expected the Wilis to start rising from the murky depths of the Thames...

Wonderful to see Osipova's Giselle - I had been repeatedly checking Twitter too in case of cast changes. Nunez was superb as Myrtha & I hope she'll dance this role again as next time I'll take binoculars to appreciate all the subtleties from the amphi. Golding's Albrecht came across to me as a man amusing himself with a bit of dalliance while waiting for the village tavern to open. Which I thought worked well with Osipova's interpretation. Sadly though, I just didn't feel any depth of emotion from Golding as the performance progressed into Act II & sensed a lack of chemistry with his partner. Agree with others that he seemed more focussed on the steps. The Wilis were sensational again. I'm really enjoying this run of Giselle.

Bennet has been very impressive as Hilarion in the performances I've seen. I saw the picture he posted on Twitter too & did wonder whether Bennet's Hilarion had missed a trick by not unbuttoning his shirt - perhaps Giselle might have started to take more notice of poor Hilarion then! Though I suspect that gruff Hilarion would never have stood a chance against Albrecht as portrayed by Federico or Vadim.

Maybe they're filming the pre-performance talk to be a bonus feature on a Vadim / Marianela DVD release as well ! Ok, so maybe I'm being a bit over-optimistic about the whole DVD thing...

Not that long ago, I seem to recall doing an online questionnaire for Odeon / ROH about the live cinema relays & one of the questions asked whether you'd be interested in a pre-performance talk - either from a local expert in person at your cinema or a broadcast. It also asked about how much / whether you'd be prepared to pay for this, the timing of the talk etc. It was quite detailed, as though it was an option being seriously investigated. I've noticed they seem to be filming a number of the Insight events too (not checked them all) & wondered if they would be live-streamed now or just a few highlights on YouTube. It's great if the ROH are making more of this content available for all.

Quite a number of tickets have suddenly become available for the remaining performances of Giselle (previously sold out) & I've just grabbed a SCS place. Do waves of good tickets often get released for productions in a batch like this? (For the 31st, there were at least 6 good SCS places. It doesn't appear to be the odd returned ticket). [Edited for clarity]

As my dancing skills are very limited, I've never progressed to thinking about a favourite dance I'd like to be able to do myself. The only time I've ever wanted to join the RB on stage was during Hofesh Shechter's Untouchable, because it just looked like everybody on stage was having such a fabulous time & I'd love to have been part of that - hidden away at the back! There's lots of ballets I haven't seen yet. So far, my favourites at the RB have been: Giselle Manon The Two Pigeons (many thanks for recommending it, FLOSS) La Fille Mal Gardee Onegin Swan Lake Rhapsody Plus the Bolshoi's Lost Illusions.

From the ballets I've seen so far, my reaction has ranged from absolutely loving it, to amused bemusement or polite interest. With one exception: Le Corsaire. I've only seen it once & I became aware in Act I that it was making me feel incredibly angry. It just seemed to cross a line for me. Though as a number of posters have listed it in the favourite ballet thread, perhaps I should give it another chance.

This is a brief (ish!) summary of my understanding from reading the article I mentioned (post #144) in the RB's Giselle programme, which is an interview with Peter Wright about his interpretation of Giselle: - While Giselle's heart is broken by Albrecht, she dies because she stabs herself. As it's suicide, she doesn't have a Christian burial & so is buried in unhallowed ground where there isn't that protection from the evil Wilis. - The peasant girls in this production are rougher & earthier, which: "helps to illustrate the class distinction that causes all the trouble". - Count Albrecht is a challenging role for the dancer, who needs to portray to / remind the audience that he is an aristocrat, while at the same time being convincing to the villagers that he's a peasant. - Peter Wright likes it when Albrecht is played as being engaged to someone he doesn't love. It helps if Bathilde is quite a contrast to Giselle too - rather artificial & selfish. So it's more credible that Albrecht could love Giselle & want to be with her. Also, understandable to the audience that Albrecht would want to get away from the palace, with its more rigid & artificial life. - He also mentions that in a Rhineland village in the time period of Giselle, a local duke would have had droit de seigneur. As there's no mention in the story of Giselle's father. Berthe may also have experienced a similar fate in love, to her daughter, Giselle. Which could explain why Giselle's dancing & looks are different to the other peasants - she is technically illegitimate & has some "blue blood". - The article asks Peter Wright why he doesn't mention all this intricate back story in the synopsis to his production. The reason he gives is that ultimately these are suggestions to help the dancers with character building & a lot can be left to their own individual interpretation (except changing the steps or the story). I found the article interesting & worth a read. Personally, I found the interpretation of both the casts I've seen to be credible. Anyway, I thought the above summary might be of interest after the discussion yesterday.

Tonight's performance was absolutely blissful. I'm on the train back & feel like I could float the 100+ miles home in my Giselle happy bubble instead! Vadim, Marianela & all the cast gave a superb performance again. I was sat front amphi this time & so was able to fully appreciate the subtler details. Their Giselle & Albrecht conveyed such tenderness towards each other in Act II & such depth of emotion, just in the way they touched or looked at each other. Matthew Ball & Yasmine Naghdi had that same quality in their stunning debut of R&J. Making it utterly believable. Interestingly, there's an article in the RB's Giselle programme which could have been written in direct response to much of the above discussion as in it Peter Wright answers a number of points! I would expand but I've never posted on my mobile before & am not sure it'll even work! What a wonderful evening. Can't wait for the Giselle live cinema relay.

I've had the same difficulty to explain the combined impact of the dancing, storyline, staging, music & the overall sheer beauty. The best I've managed is to say that I hope eternity contains the kind of feelings that watching Giselle & Vadim's dancing creates for me. Hugely looking forward to seeing the performance tomorrow night too

I was also at both performances of Giselle on Thursday 17th & enjoyed them so much that I'm still floating in a ballet bubble. I actually woke up next morning with the music & dancing flitting through my dreams I thought the ROH made a very sensible call given the unfortunate circumstances with the scheduled cast in the evening performance & it was a real treat to unexpectedly see Marianela & Vadim. Hopefully Natalia (or Sarah) will be recovered enough to dance on the 29th March, as I have a ticket & would love to see either of them dance Giselle then, with Marianela as Myrtha. Initially, I also felt something similar to SMballet during Act I, but then I actually found it making sense in the context of Marianela/Vadim's interpretation. Admittedly, I haven't seen many performances of Giselle, but Marianela's Giselle came across to me as far more sunny, happy & balanced than, say, compared to Osipova's (cinema & DVD) portrayal of a more fragile Giselle which then makes complete sense of her violent reaction to Acosta/Albrecht's arrogance & duplicity. In terms of Marianela & Vadim's portrayal of their characters, like SMballet, it also came across to me that Giselle & Albrecht are genuinely in love in Act I. But I could imagine a back story where Albrecht's engagement to Bathilde was more of an old-fashioned / medieval-style, strategic marital alliance (for wealth, land, important connections etc) which he felt pressured into making rather than a love match. And Vadim/Albrecht's greeting of Bathilde is far cooler, more distantly polite than his interactions with Giselle. So although Albrecht truly does love Giselle, in my imagined scenario he knows their marriage could never happen due to the vast differences in station between them & his inability to change that. Albrecht should not have deceived Giselle (or himself) that their relationship had any realistic future - which is irrespective of the fact that he is engaged to another woman. So given Marianela's radiant depiction of Giselle & her character, it made sense to me that Giselle's extreme reaction was as much due to the impossibility of their love, as to the shock of the discovery that he is already engaged to another, or the betrayal / character flaw in the man she loves. This then flowed into Act II with the tangible strength of their bond & intense spiritual connection. Anyway, that's how I interpreted Act I. I'm sure others will have different views. Perhaps Vadim & Marianela will talk about their take on their characters during the extra features in the live cinema relay & reveal more! Beautifully put & I also found the evening's Act II truly special. It was so beautiful & extraordinarily moving. I was two-thirds of the way back in the amphi & I felt Itziar's excellent Myrtha managed to go beyond frightening to having a darker, more slightly unhinged quality which made her Myrtha feel dangerous, unpredictable & completely capable of the most terrible revenges! The Wilis' were outstanding & the rest of the cast in both the matinee & evening performance were all so good. Lauren & Federico gave a great performance & I also especially enjoyed Olivia Cowley's Bathilde, Claire Calvert's Myrtha & Yasmine Naghdi with Marcelino Sambé in the pas de six. So glad I have tickets for Marianela/Vadim again on the 22nd, plus their cinema relay to look forward to. I hope for a DVD release too!

That's what I was wondering in my earlier post (#59): is Dr Pozzi included to show that as a professional man, his reputation could survive, maybe even be enhanced by a daring / suggestive painting (which was done a year or two before Madame X). But Amélie Gautreau, who also moved in high Parisian social circles could not because she was a woman & different standards applied? I have no in-depth historical knowledge & haven't read the book, but that would make more sense to me than to just use Dr Pozzi to depict an affair or Sargent painting another portrait. Without this element, the basic story of Strapless - woman loses social position due to bad luck in pose chosen for a portrait - feels rather vapid to me. [Edited: Added for clarity & forgot the ?]

There's lots on at the Mayflower depending on your taste - www.mayflower.org.uk/Whats_On?br=shows At least four different dance events, including Nederlands Dans Theatre 2 & Matthew Bourne's Sleeping Beauty. Plus opera, drama, musicals... The £15 fare may not have shown if your journey didn't start at a South West Trains station / part of its network. It might be worth looking at the whether the cost of splitting your ticket works out cheaper. So that one ticket gets you to/from the start of the £15 zone & the other ticket is the £15 offer. Good luck!

That explains it - I noticed the different leg lengths but not why! Personally, I thought Muntagirov had just the height/body proportion combination to actually pull off this particular design of costume. I've noticed on a number of occasions when seeing different casts in the same production, that whoever is cast in the male principal role is required to wear exactly the same costume irrespective of whether it's flattering to them or not. Plus the men often seem to keep their own natural hair colour, unlike the women who'll wear wigs. To my eye, someone with dark hair like Federico Bonelli usually looks good & stands out whatever he's required to wear on stage. Whereas dancers like Vadim with his lighter brown hair can sometimes seem to fade away & blend into the scenery. Maybe it's because I'm usually up in the Amphi, but I particularly remember thinking in Manon that Vadim's hair & eyebrows could have done with being darkened a little with that particular costume!

Thanks, Alison. It's with South West Trains: From 26th January - 30 April 2016*, we're offering advance off-peak day return tickets for just £15 adults & £5 kids, to over 170 destinations across the South West Trains network! You can save up to 78%*! I hope it's an offer you can take advantage of too. It's meant I can book quite a few trips to the ROH plus other excursions in London over the coming months - I just have to remember to book my train ticket before the day I want to travel! [Edited to restore the bold effect]

I saw this on the opening night & whilst I didn't feel that the triple bill was as good as I'd hoped it would be, I still had a very enjoyable evening. Especially as it was lovely to see so many RB dancers in featured roles in the course of one evening. Within the Golden Hour was undoubtedly the ballet I responded to the most. It felt far more satisfying & complete to me than the other two. As others have said, all the dancers involved gave such good, committed performances. I especially thought Marcelino Sambé & Luca Acri, plus Vadim Muntagirov & Beatriz Stix-Brunell were terrific. As with Within the Golden Hour, I hadn't seen After the Rain before so had no other performance to compare it with. I think a few other posters have commented that the pdd didn't seem to connect with the first half & I was also puzzled by the synopsis in one of the ROH programme articles which I'd read beforehand, as to me it wasn't matching what I was seeing on stage. I hope it's ok to quote one sentence: "There's no explicit storyline, but it's easy to read ideas of farewell, of change, of letting go into Wheeldon's images". I was sat up in the Amphi & didn't get that feeling from the pdd at all, though it was beautifully danced by Marianela Nuñez & Thiago Soares. Perhaps if I'd remembered to get my binoculars out in time, I'd have picked up on the intended themes better. But it came across to me as more of a duet between a couple who had been romantically involved for a long time & celebrated longstanding intimacy, empathy & complete understanding between them as their relationship evolved & matured into deeper layers. Due to my concern that I wasn't 'getting it', I didn't enjoy it as much as others clearly did, as by the time I realised I should stop puzzling & just go with the flow, it was over As for the middle ballet, I loved the recent Singer-Sargent exhibition at the NPG & it was a treat to see several of his portraits brought to life in Strapless. Federico Bonnelli in particular was astonishingly like Dr Pozzi. His dressing gown appeared suitably gorgeous & I thought the cut of many of the costumes looked superb on the dancers. At the interval, one of the people sitting next to me (it's a lovely bonus when I find I'm sitting next to a balletcoforum member) commented on how effective they thought the dark costumes at the start were in creating the effect of silhouettes in the picture frames. For me, once that initial effect had passed, I found the black-on-black very distancing & alienating from the story. Perhaps everyone being in black was meant to indicate the commonalities between the people within Parisian society, but I found it a relief when Dr Pozzi arrived on stage wearing a splash of red & the costumes started becoming more vivid . In both the first & last ballets I enjoyed the music & felt it complimented the movement. This wasn't the case for me with Strapless. Unlike other ballets I've seen recently (notably Rhapsody & The Two Pigeons which are on the point of becoming earworms) I can't replay any of the music for Strapless in my mind, or really recall much of the choreography. The sets of Strapless were very evocative & effective at creating mood, but personally I found the frequent substantial set shifting jarring & distracting from the story. I hope someone has found a way to quieten the thunderous rollers on those six mobile panels - the noise level had the unintentional effect of making me want to laugh. Sadly, overall Strapless felt undernourished & unsatisfying to me. I had a very strong sense of an opportunity missed & that the talents of the dancers, in particular Edward Watson & Matthew Ball, had been seriously underused or not used to best effect. I came away with the impression that it had relied more upon acting skills than dance movement to tell the story. However, I did enjoy the performance simply because all the dancers involved were totally giving their best with the material they'd been given. And there were some very effective sections, particularly with Matthew Ball mirroring Natalia Osipova in the portrait painting scene to explain how Sargent had been inspired to create the final pose used for Madame X. Also the ending moving into the present day, to depict the contrast of the legacy & endurance of the painting over 130 years later. I think I'd have felt more empathy & connection towards Amélie Gautreau as portrayed on the stage, if I'd felt more of the difference in the way society viewed & reacted to the portrait of Madame X compared to the portrait of Dr Pozzi. I understand both were considered daring paintings at the time. Both were posed suggestively, hinting at their sexuality - either with a strap down or painted with a hand on the dressing gown belt as though it was about to be removed. Dr Pozzi had a reputation as a ladies man & of having numerous affairs. Yet it was Amélie Gautreau's reputation that suffered, rather than Dr Pozzi's or Singer Sargent's (in the long term) suggesting underlying injustice / hypocrisy / double standards which could have been made more of to create a feeling of audience sympathy. (I am assuming this was the reason for including Dr Pozzi in the first place, not just so he could be used to depict Amélie Gautreau as having affairs. Plus the hand on the dressing gown belt pose was very clearly & carefully emphasised to the audience.) Having said all the above (which has turned out rather longer than expected - making up for a long time in not posting!) I suspect that for me, Strapless will benefit from further viewings which Raven Girl did too. I booked to see the second cast next week some time ago, but grabbed a return yesterday so I can enjoy seeing the first cast again next week too - I particularly need to appreciate Marianela & Thiago's pdd properly! My seat is much lower down in the auditorium & closer to the stage, which I think may help my appreciation. Thank goodness there's a bargain £15 train ticket offer to get me there!

Thanks for posting about this. The Odyssey is touring to Salisbury Playhouse in mid-April & I've already got my ticket, as I thought their production of Dracula was fabulous. (It came to Salisbury for two nights - I saw it on the first & enjoyed it so much that I wanted to see it again & managed to get last-minute tickets for the second night.) I do hope Jonathon Goddard makes a speedy, full recovery. I'd love to see him dance again in April, but the whole company was so impressive that like Lin, I'm sure that whoever replaces him will do a good job too.

I think this is what I'm trying to say in a clumsy way. You're right, but it doesn't appear to be the case that all her fans are feeling this emotion. This is why I feel some form of communication would be prudent - to change the mood, bring back the buzz / excitement / anticipation for RB audiences who are Osipova fans. It seems to me the modern world is all about shaping & managing public perception.

Because the world of ballet is relatively new to me, I think what's struck me is the contrast between the current situation with Natalia Osipova & what would most likely happen if an approximation of this circumstance happened to someone who is as highly talented / as high profile / huge draw to the public in other spheres such as certain sports, entertainment, pop music, Hollywood etc In these other spheres, based on what I've seen in the past, there would probably be PR on the case, a press conference or press statement, perhaps interviews etc etc Maybe greater concern to protect & manage public image. I find it interesting. Anyway, this discussion is making things clearer to me now - thank you. As has been said, there is certainly a case for respecting people's privacy (which I support), but on the other hand also a case for updating fans when making certain public appearances but not others. I just feel maybe the balance is slightly out in these particular circumstances & agree a brief, factual statement would be prudent. It could be jointly from both the RB & Natalia Osipova herself, gaining goodwill & some good PR for the RB's new season ahead

I'll second that & also thanks to all the other posters too. I'm seeing the performance in Southampton tonight & now feel totally in the zone for R&J

I'm very pleased that Natalia Osipova appears to be recovering so quickly & hope to see her back at the ROH for performances in the Winter Season. After reading this thread, I was wondering how the Royal Ballet / other ballet companies have managed this type of situation in the past: when a dancer is sufficiently recovered to guest elsewhere but for whatever reason, will not be dancing with their home ballet company for a period. Do they tend to give some sort of interim update? Or does it tend to be more down to the individual dancer themselves to update fans if they wish?