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Northern Ballet Theatre‘Carmen’ March 2000 London, Sadler's Wells by Bruce Marriott |
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After the success of their Dracula run last year NBT are back at Sadler's Wells with 2 weeks of Carmen - popular tunes, popular story and popular ballet. Well not quite popular ballet as such - it's actually danced in bare foot style, which is pretty unusual for a dramatic work from a ballet company. It's actually very unusual for any full length story work and the only other piece which immediately come to mind is Christopher Bruce's recent God's Plenty - but little else I think over the last couple of decades I think? The Carmen choreography is by Didy Veldman of Rambert - her first full length piece - and I think she made a really terrific job of it. I liked it when I first saw it, but since then mods have been made here and there and the dancers all seem very settled-in and very comfortable. But what really does it for me is the different aesthetic - a joy to see bare feet illustrate something they don't usually: a popular story. Veldman's style appears very straightforward but she has a good knack of finding a movement to express and capture the moment. Of course MacMillan developed this into a fine art and Veldman is on the same trail I think. I particularly like the pas de deux which seem so free and inventive - the absence of pointe shoes make them all the more real. Perhaps it's her Dutch manner and also the influence of Patricia Doyle (the Director) but there is a wonderful directness in her showing of character and shorn of embellishment the story is incredibly easy to follow and you find that you concentrate on it rather than trying to figure out where you might be in the plot and who is who (and please don't smile and think good grief does this man really have difficulty in spotting lead characters like Carmen and Jose! It's the lesser characters which often cause the grief). I'm probably just slow on the general uptake but I do welcome this clarity of presentation. And I don't miss the pointe shoes for an instant. Charlotte Broom was the lead and Daniel de Andrade the 'doomed' Jose - they premiered the piece originally and are both accomplished actor/dancers. Broom vamps her man as few ballerinas could but also beautifully conveys the 'struck by love' party girl who succumbs to a true love for all of a night or two before the restlessness returns. In tone this is a million miles away from the Roland Petit version that shocked audiences in the late 1940's and 50's with its incredibly overt sexuality. The Veldman Carmen is still the story of a very surprising woman, but in its different world its more plausible in the telling and all the better for that.
Carmen is one of my favourite dramatic works of recent times - straightforward, respectful of what audiences appreciate and yet engagingly different. Veldman herself dances the lead on the 28th and 30th March, but what I hope more than anything is that this is not the last full length dramatic piece from her.
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