Dawnstar

Does anyone know from experience in previous years whether the City area is likely to get back to normal fairly quickly once roads open following the Lord Mayor's Show or whether it takes a long time for crowds to disperse? According to the website roads should re-open at 4-5pm. I'm due to be getting a train that arrives at Liverpool Street at 5.45pm. So I'm wondering if walking to the ROH as I normally do will be possible or if I'd be fighting my way through big crowds the whole way? (Fortunately the other events look to be some distance from my route so I'm hoping they won't be a problem.)

@Scheherezade Oh yes, I've heard that those NT front stalls tickets are extremely popular.

Three according to @Saodan's website (the ROH performance database not having got that far yet). Two she was scheduled for plus one replacing Takada.

@alison I don't know what a BSOD is but it doesn't sound good. I think if my computer declined to work just at the time of Friday rush then it'd find itself being thrown out of the nearest window! @Scheherezade Were there any tickets left after 3 hours of queuing? I think the only theatre website I've had to queue for that long on was the RAH for Proms bookings some years ago.

I'm very sorry that my comment yesterday came over as rude. I too have been checking the website for tickets on a number of occasions recently & it is depressing to me when the only ones that appear are way out of my price range. It means I have just had to tackle a stressful Friday rush where, while I have managed to get tickets, they're not exactly in the particular position that I was after. I don't know how other people find Friday rush but I find it so stressful that I feel anxious for hours beforehand & am now shaking with adreneline in the aftermath. Hence I really wish I could afford to buy any available tickets rather than be confined to only a handful!

Unfortunately there's a large financial gulf between wanting to go & being able to afford to go at £150 a ticket!

She had 2 performances as Kitri in 2019, as well as dancing Mercedes, Queen of the Dryads & Fandago lead over a number of other performances. So the cinema performance would have been her 6th Kitri, at least at the ROH, I don't know if she's danced it anywhere else. She managed to stay upright alright for her debut performance in 2019, although Clarke as Espada did get injured in Act I (not in an obvious to the audience way) & had to be replaced by Edmonds for Act III. Don Q does seem to be a bit of an injury-prone production all round!

I've started catching up on the ROH's stream. Despite my best efforts to improve my recognition of the dancers in the lower ranks, there were still several in the class who I couldn't identify (mostly girls). If only they'd all followed Sissens's example & worn jackets with their surnames on the back!

He fell over too? Oh dear, it sounds like they would have been better broadcasting the performance on 28th, when I don't recall anyone falling over, than last night's! I hope he wasn't injured, given his Espada debut is due shortly. I agree he seems to be getting increasing numbers of bigger roles, though I have yet to see him do anything with a big classical solo. I wonder if he could be in line for Benno later in the season or if he'd be considered the wrong type? There were a couple of taller Bennos, Richardson & Jun, in the last run.

I have no idea if there is a rule about not filming someone debuting but it does feel like it would cause extra stress to a dancer which probably isn't ideal for a debut. I was actually rather surprised they had a debutant Espada for the cinema cast. Also in terms of spreading cinecasts among the RB Principals Kaneko & Bracewell had last year's Nutcracker whereas Magri hasn't before had the lead for a cinecast as far as I can remember. (I know Ball had last year's SB but he wasn't originally scheduled for Don Q.) Dancers not getting a single public performance is certainly annoying (I still haven't forgiven the RB for only giving Hamilton a Schools matinee as Manon in 2019 so I'll have waited 5 years to see her in the role!). One public performance I'm usually okay with but this season I do wish Buvoli's sole Sugar Plum Fairy wasn't on New Year's Day, as I really want to see her but my trains are going to be screwed.

If that is the case I would ask that if the ROH doesn't consider seats good enough for invited guests then why are they happy to sell them for ever increasing amounts of money to the general public! Nunez was already filmed when the production was new in 2013 and the ROH usually avoids filming the same Principals in the same production twice. (Hopefully Muntagirov will eventually get filmed as Basilio if he ever dances Don Q with someone else.)

Thanks. I've booked front row stalls for one of the two casts I'm hoping to see. I can't afford to book for the other one at the moment so I'll have to hope either this or a similar offer is still available come December.

While it'll be good if they can sort out the RMT issues, the Aslef strikes are even more disruptive than RMT's & it sounds like they will be continuing. (And even if there aren't any Christmas strikes this year my trains to London are still due to be screwed due to engineering works!)

It seems a great pity if the ROH can't fill the house even when giving seats away!

Empty seats? Was it not full? Given many of the seats were presumably either free or greatly reduced in price then it seems odd if it wasn't full.

Reading all the reports from last night mkes me think that in hindsight I'm glad I was unable to get a ticket for that performance & had to go on 28th instead, though I was decidedly annoyed at the time booking opened, as on 28th the audience weren't too over-enthusiastic & Mayara Magri didn't fall over. I'm booked to see the cinema encore on Monday but will now be attending with some trepidation as it's never nice to see a dancer fall on stage but especially not for them when it's being filmed.

I can just about understand accidentally putting a performance on sale then withdrawing it shortly afterwards but that performance must have been on sale for at least a month and a half, given I gather it was available to book for all levels of Friends & was only marked as off-sale the night before public booking. How could no-one at the ROH have noticed a performance was on sale that shouldn't have been for weeks on end?

Wasn't that 19th March matinee a Schools performance or Welcome performance or something like that? I'm pretty sure it wasn't available for public booking & that was why Bonelli's official farewell performance with speeches & flowers was done on 4th March. So while Kaneko & Bracewell did dance SL together in the last run most people wouldn't have been able to see them no matter how much they wanted to.

Today's links includes a short article on Gramilano about the SL casting that says "Lauren Cuthbertson returns to the stage in a full-length ballet for the first time after the birth of her second child" but isn't she doing both The Nutcracker & Manon before SL? I suppose as the SPF only appears in one act of The Nutcracker then maybe that isn't counted as a full-length role but the title role in Manon certainly is full-length.

How about the ROH having the courtesy to tell the general public why they were suddenly excluded from booking that performance at only a few hours' notice? Also, given the ROH's frequent comments in recent years about how hard up they are, it feels like having a performance be changed from general booking to half or more of the audience being invite only is throwing away quite a lot of potential revenue. (I assume the invitees are likely to be getting free or reduced tickets.)

I hope so. June would give Calvert longer to return from maternity leave. However if she isn't ready then I hope Edmonds gets to do it with someone else, as it would seem unfair if he didn't get to dance because his previous partner chose to have a baby! I've been checking the ROH website for the Nutcracker cast change pretty much every day since McRae announced his injury, so replacement casting can't come soon enough for me! (Yes, I am booked for that Nutcracker cast.)

It's a bit awkward not to have the casting for the second block of shows before booking opens for the first block. Given how eye-watering the SL prices are I'm going to have to limit myself to only seeing 2 or 3 casts but it's difficult to choose between casts when some casts are still unknown. I definitely want to see Lamb, as it may be the last chance & so far all I've seen of her O/O is half of Act II. Then Kaneko/Muntagirov is my next pick out of the known casts but with 2 or 3 casts unknown.... @JNC I agree with your sentiments in a general sense but with SL being so expensive I felt relieved when seeing the casts that there were so many pairs I'd already seen in 2022 & can therefore live without seeing this time. If all the partnerships had been swapped then I'd find it much harder to choose between them!

Post removed as info already on World Ballet Day thread. I'm afraid it didn't occur to me to check that thread first for Anemoi casting.

Sure enough, the majority of tickets below amphitheatre level have been sold since last night. I wonder how much they went for? Probably considerably less than the £39 I paid for my restricted view bench.

The ROH Autumn 23 booking thread.