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Jack of All Trades..
Kevin Richmond English National Ballet by Bruce Marriott with Margaret Lumley | ||||||||
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Kevin Richmond joined Festival Ballet - now English National Ballet - over 21 years ago. He joined a company where Nureyev was just setting Romeo and Juliet, and with Deane's recent Romeo he has just clocked up his third production of it. Never to be a Principal, but always admired within and without the company, he has now reached the hurdle that dancers must dread: what next in life when the dancing effectively stops? We met at the Albert Hall during the recent Romeo season and had a box all to ourselves as, below, a rehearsing Juliet loved and died this way and that. "Thoughtful, steady, reflective" come to mind when talking to Richmond. A nice, if slightly boring, chap then? No! He has a great sense of fun, renown for it in fact. Not loud, but the jokes and asides ring though in what is an interesting interview at perhaps not one of the easiest times in a dancer's life. But first things first - he proudly disports his contribution (nay sacrifice), to the new Romeo; a head of hair severely cut back and with a proper Friars tonsure (bald patch) as well. Such dedication in one so old, we agree!
Richmond's Friar was better sketched in than you normally find and the extra time given to his scenes were repaid in a Friar who understood and consoled a frightened Juliet with calmness and authority. For Richmond, the major downside of playing the Friar was only appearing in a few scenes and not being involved all the way through, as he has been before. The first ballet he performed in professionally was Nureyev's Romeo and Juliet, a piece created especially for the company: "mindblowing, mindblowing! And Lynn Seymour coming in at that time as well. I consider myself very fortunate to have gone through that era." The Nureyev link is perhaps more tangible because, like most kids, Richmond questioned (at times) why he was bothering with ballet, and seeing Nureyev dance was the thing that inspired him the most. What a way to join a company; straight in and working with your hero. In Ashton's almost chamber-ballet version of Romeo and Juliet, he played Tybalt. In 1985 Peter Schaufuss brought the production over from Denmark where Ashton originally created it in 1958 (coincidentally the year Richmond was born). Richmond remembers Neils Bjorn Larsen bringing the handwritten manuscript of the ballet with him and rehearsing just the first act to see if an elderly Ashton would countenance their putting the whole ballet on. "It looks very good." Ashton is reported to have said, though it's perhaps not so clear exactly how much he recalled of the original. The Ashton move was typical of Schaufuss, and for Richmond these were probably the best of times in the company. "The choreographers that Peter came with, it was such an exciting time. Everyone was looking to London Festival/English National (because that's when it changed) to see what they were doing, which tour, which choreographer (Petit, Bejart, Ashton, Bruce...), which guest would be coming in." Richmond also recalls the difficulty and excitement of learning La Sylphide and the Bournonville style that Schaufuss wanted and also the boys' tour to Denmark. "25 men and we did every solo from every ballet you ever heard of! We did a 3 hour evening, finishing with Bolero. We had one girl - Brenda Edwards. And we did Swansong. It was a fabulous evening. Peter was very much into that masculine, male, thing. If the Schaufuss period was Richmond's most exciting time, then working with Christopher Bruce was the pinnacle: "Well Chris is probably my favourite choreographer. I mean he certainly did a lot for me and at a time when there was a lull in my dancing. 'Do I really want to go on as a dancer. Do I want to be a brick-layer or something...' I though I would give my arm to work with
It should now come as no surprise that the dancing highlight of his career was creating one of the two guards roles in Bruce's Swansong. "It was just a wonderful, wonderful experience working on it. There were 4 of us there; Christopher, Koen, Matz and myself. And we all got on extremely well. And Chris would set a step and we would all look at each other and say 'you've got to be joking we can't do that! But if we do this...' And he would say 'ok you can do that, but do it with your back this way.' From that conversation came the conversation that you see in Swansong. Things like lighting a cigarette and coming on with it literally happened one day when I went out for a break and when I came back I said 'Koen you must be dying for a cigarette and you can't have one!' And Chris said 'Ok we will keep it in.' As a consequence there is now a cigarette moment in the ballet." The inevitable next question is to ask if he came back from a break with a plastic red nose at any time?! (the nose features prominently in Swansong at one point). "Actually Chris was going to call it Clowns. But later it became Swansong. It was actually his last piece for the company - maybe!". ENB also took Swansong to Argentina, which was rather brave, given the nature of the dictatorship at the time. "We were wondering just how they were going to take this... (in rehearsal) We walked on stage and put the chair, and the curtains down, and we're just warming up, and they have this situation where they have security guards in the theatre. And these guys were sat downstage left - 3 guys, with machine guns watching this ballet. So the next day we come down and put the chair etc and practicing (the tap routine is briefly stamped out). And these guys are still there and we are getting ready for curtain up and there is banter and chating away as we get ourselves psyched-up. The 3 guys come in and they just look and then suddenly start tapping around the chair. ....we just thought 'very funny guys'!" Despite the repression, the audience loved it and "cheered like crazy". It's a piece that has always got terrific reaction and many stage-door comments. "I'm glad that Swansong happened for me actually; I'm very selfish about that!" It's an enduring piece and to have helped define it would make anybody proud, not least somebody who can be as self-effacing as Richmond. At 40, Richmond is now dancing mainly character roles. It's perhaps handy then that in his youth he went to drama school and indeed was originally set to become an actor. While he clearly enjoys thinking his roles through, there is not really enough work for him.
With age and a less useful body also comes the chop. The reality is that most dancers don't go on to become character artists long term or to take up positions within the artistic administration of companies; there are few slots and they tend to be occupied long term. Instead dancers have to forge new lives for themselves, often outside the only life they have ever known and the tight-knit 24-hours-a-day, 7-days-a-week community of a company. It's something that dancers know about and can see coming, but of course that still doesn't make it any easier. Richmond's contract with ENB runs out in August 1999 - so he has a year to figure out what he wants to do with his life for the next 20 years. Understandably, he is a mixture of emotions: understanding that his is not a unique position and that ENB have treated him as well as might be expected in the circumstances, and some bitterness that he can't carry on doing something he does well in a company and profession he loves - "I'd like to think that I can put something back into the company." "I really don't know what I want to do with myself, where I want to go," belies all the thought that he is putting into his future. But he is determined not to rush into anything prematurely and notes the advice of some other dancers: "... it's better to take yourself away from it for 6 months totally. Then decide what you think you might want to do." Nice if you have the money. We run through some of the options. Many dancers go into gardening (or flower selling in Stephen Wicks case), "There is something creative in watching plants grow and designing gardens. I enjoy gardening - but I don't want to be a gardener." Acting is a possibility, but he would have to retrain, "I'm very two-minded about acting because I started there." He likes using computers... but is not particularly enthusiastic about going into a strictly IT job. Then there is DIY "I like building things!". "I've also fried fish and chips in Woolworths (that was pretty bad) and I've stacked shelves in Waitrose." So there is quite a variety of options outside of the dance world then! But one senses that there are things that Richmond still can do, and wants to do, in the dance world. "I like being with people, talking to people, breaking down those barriers,
He sums it all up with: "Job wanted - Jack of all Trades.... I'm open to suggestions! It will be interesting to see what feedback I might get!" This is both witty and a serious request for ideas and sums up the man well. But don't make the mistake of thinking he is burying his head in the sand. One of the things we are going to try and do over the next 12-18 months is to track Kevin's moving on to pastures new. We all appreciate that it is not necessarily going to be a smooth ride, but it's a process that nearly all dancer's go through and we feel it is important to cover all aspects of a dancers lot. Exactly how we will track things has yet to be decided but it is likely to be an occasional series and a mixture of Kevin's written thoughts and some chats (assisted by wine possibly...)
We wish Kevin more than well and somehow don't believe we will see him frying fish and chips in Woolworths again! In the meantime, do enjoy his final performances with ENB and also revisit Swansong if you get the opportunity; he helped make it the truly great piece that it is.
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