BRB 'Swan Lake' reviews 'Swan Lake' reviews Sakuma in reviews Tait in reviews recent BRB reviews

The Birmingham Royal Ballet has not had a very good press this week. Some reviews have had the unkind whiff of city sophisticates looking down their noses at their provincial cousins come to town. But there have been rumours that BRB had got better as the week progressed. On the basis of last night’s performance there is justification for these differing opinions. Let us start with what was excellent about last night. Nao Sakuma, still a soloist, was an outstanding Odette/Odile. Often dancers get the strong and sexy Odile, more in keeping with our modern feminist culture, right, while not striking an equally clear chord of sympathy with the imprisoned, but equally passionate, Odette. Nao brought off both. In Act II she begins as Rothbart’s captured bird, but realising, as her belief in Siegfried’s love increases, that she might escape, her dancing develops a thread of hope. Her movements throughout are sure, smooth and, befitting a powerful and beautiful wild thing, effortless. In contrast, as Odile, she is all sex and strong perfume.

Some credit for Sakuma’s star performance has to go to her Prince, Sergiu Pobereznic, well known to some from his days at the Royal Ballet. The Prince, as is often the case in the classic ballets, is required to inhabit all of the courtly male virtues, courtesy, balance and manliness. Sergiu displayed those to good effect in partnering his swan lover. And love her he did, in all her guises. Particularly telling were the ways in which he pulled her towards him, gently and with increasing desperation in Acts II and IV. And he has a healthy lust for Odile in Act III. Like another Russian feathered spirit, the Firebird, when he lifted her in Act IV it was to keep her with him on earth rather than to letting her fly.

In addition to the lead dancing, what set last night’s performance apart, was Peter Wright’s interpretation of this classic as a political and physiological drama. Politics has always been an underlying theme in Swan Lake. (It is no coincidence that the villain has a German name, and in this production he even seems to be wearing a Teutonic knight’s helmet.)

The death of the King, brilliantly presented as a prologue funeral procession, set the scene. Interregnums are never easy times. This Queen Mother, (the critics were spot on in noting Marion Tait’s excellent character performance), and her son do live in a small kingdom in need of alliances. This is well brought out in Act III where each princess is introduced by her national delegation and then gets a shot of dancing with the prince, combining elements of a beauty parade with blind date. Interestingly Odile’s courtiers mark her entrance with the Spanish dance, a 19th century equivalent of the salsa. One wonders how the Queen Mother will take the news of the King’s heir, and her son’s, death? Somehow one feels this Queen would have found a way of keeping the kingdom intact.

This Swan Lake marks Siegfried’s evolution from an impressionable and immature young man to a heroic figure. At his first entrance he is, like Odette, fighting against his destiny to wear the crown and the accompanying entrapment of marriage. His friends can easily seduce him to act like a juvenile. As the ballet goes on he grows in maturity, and therefore his death is the greater loss. Odette also displays her mental anguish. In Act IV her grief is not just for the loss of Siegfried, but also for what he means; freedom from her false reality and the opportunity to transform into her real self.

But not everything was right with this production. Act 1, often a happy, albeit usually somewhat boring, peasant’s teaser for the drama to come, did not start well. Carol-Anne Millar and Ambra Vallo, made good courtesans, but the prince’s companions were lumpy, and some of the Act’s choreography seemed ridiculous. Further, while the scenery for the Lake was lovely with moonlight floating on the water, the dancing was not. The swans particularly in their initial scenes did not have their act together. Some have argued what was lacking were more swans, but it is not certain that a quantitative difference would have necessarily meant a qualitative one. Yet, the cygnets, passed with flying colours. So what happened to the rest of the flock?

Finally, we come to the costumes. They must have had a sale on brocade and velvet somewhere in Birmingham when they were putting this show together since the national dancers were overloaded. While ballet is theatre, there is something wrong when the clothes get in the way of the movement. The Russian dance by the men (a whole chorus of young men in blue tights and elder statesmen in clone-like black hair and beards wearing heavy gold coats) was a disgrace to the Russian folk dancing tradition. These guys certainly would not have thrown their vodka glasses into the air at the end of that sad routine. And someone should sell the swans’ outfits to the Trocaderos and get these birds some new feathers. It may give them the lift they need.

At the end it comes down to whether this production had magic. Often the Swans produce it with their regimented and powerful beauty in Act II. While there were no moments like that in this performance, there was Nao Sakuma whose dancing will be remembered.