Northern Ballet - The Little Mermaid - touring Autumn 2022

[Jan McNulty]

I'm a bit late posting about the performances I saw of Little Mermaid in Sheffield.

 

The company is looking on great form and I really enjoyed all 3 performances.

 

David Nixon based this 2017 work on the original fairy tale so it is not all sweetness and light like the Disney cartoon.  The set is very clever with its 2 giant curved walls that can be changed to become sea/a ship/land as appropriate.  The costumes are just gorgeous.

 

Marilla is the youngest mermaid daughter of Lyr the king of the sea.  She wants to go to the surface to see what her sisters have seen.  Lyr reluctantly lets her.  Her best friend the seahorse Dillion tries to persuade her not to go.  She finds the human Prince Adair and saves him from the shipwreck and falls in love with him.

 

Marilla persuades her father that she wants to live on the land.  Meanwhile Dana has found Adair on the beach as he awakes to see her - he thinks it is Dana who has saved him.

 

In Act 2, Marilla finds out what living on land means to her - she loses her tail to legs and discovers just how painful the transformation is in a very powerful solo.  She has also lost her beautiful voice.

 

She is at the court of Adair.  His mother presents Dana as his bride and Marilla is distraught.  She returns to the sea but it is too late and her soul ascends to heaven.

 

The corps represent the sea/waves and courtiers.  Some of the flowing choreography for them as the sea is very beautiful and enhanced by the flowing skirt costumes.

 

The court dances on land are fun and there are some nice duets for Adair/Dana and Adair/Marilla.

 

I saw 2 casts over the three performances.  New dancer Amber Lewis was very touching as Marilla.  I found her an incredibly expressive dancer.  Her Adair was the always elegant Jonathan Hanks.  Aerys Merrill danced Dillion.  Alessandra Bramante was a lovely gentle Dana and Gavin McCaig frightened the life out of me as Lyr. I saw this cast on Thursday afternoon and Friday evening.

 

Abby Prudames and Joe Taylor, who created the leading roles in 2017, were truly outstanding on Thursday evening.  Sarah Chun was an affecting Dana and Sean Bates gave a powerful performance as Lyr.  Filippo di Vilio was Dillion.

[alison]

I do wish they'd bring this one down south.  Did someone say we were getting Gatsby for the third time?

[Pas de Quatre]

It is on at the Mayflower Southampton 20-22 October.

Edited October 11, 2022 by Pas de Quatre

[alison]

So it is.  But that's probably over £30 in train travel in addition to the ticket price.

[Pas de Quatre]

Alison, you asked for the South, you can't get much further South without going West! Or did you just mean London?

[AnneL]

I am also posting late, due to dodgy (actually unusable) hotel WiFi. I saw The Little Mermaid at Newcastle Theatre Royal on Thursday afternoon and enjoyed it very much. We live in the south but my husband comes from Tyneside, so we timed a trip to see his relatives to coincide with a ballet treat! I saw the same cast as the first one mentioned by Jan and they all conveyed the characters through their dancing very well. Amber Lewis’s mermaid solo, almost fighting with her ‘new’ legs, was particularly memorable.
The specially written score was pleasant to listen to, appropriate for dancing and the choreography fitted it well. The orchestra under Jonathan Lo were excellent. Understandably for a matinee there were many children in the audience and clearly some of them expected something more Disney-like than this version. It was suitable for children, but Disney it was not, but probably closer to the original tale. There was no ‘happy ever after’ ending and it was something of a cautionary tale - be careful what you wish for. It somehow reminded me of the Red Shoes in that way. And as Jan said, Lyr was scary! So it was suitable for adults as well as children.