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My memory was of a fussy, cluttered staging, diluted by its return to original choreographic intentions, a Rothbart without menace, coarse acting and underpowered performances (Stephen Jefferies was Siegfried then, no memory of his swan).

I thought then the superficial clutter that obscured the soul of Swan Lake could be easily rectified: banish the flummery and flunkies in act one, for example. Rather more problematic was the choreographic text. I am no believer in first thoughts necessarily being best. However tinkered with the text of the RB Swan Lake had become by the time this production was conceived by Anthony Dowell in the mid-80s, to jettison inspired elements (Ashton’s fourth act) is flat footed, poetically and dramatically.

Though it’s even longer (1986) since I’ve seen Peter Wright’s staging for BRB (like Dowell’s, essentially a conventional telling of the story) it was that production that kept springing to mind looking again at this RB Swan Lake. In comparison, how well Wright set the dramatic context for Siegfried having to choose a bride, how neatly Benno (if you are to include him) was integrated into the action, how logically the presentation of the princesses and the national dances flowed – essentially how dramatically well judged that production is.

No drama, nor poetry, on view this week with the RB. The clutter still gets in the way. I didn’t disentangle which was Benno among the gaggle of hammy hangers on (away with those chaperones, tutor, general, cadets, young girls, goblet droppers, boyars and passing pas de trois artistes).

Back in the 1980s I quite liked Yolanda Sonnabend’s designs in their move away from the overwrought Gothic of Leslie Hurry’s previous vision. Now I am not convinced. “A clearing by the lakeside ruins of a chapel” says the programme. More a collection of scaffolding and metallic shards. A black void upstage, where we imagine the lake to be.

Costuming is a muddle. Act three looked as though the wrong costume skips had been delivered and a combination of La giaconda and Lucrezia Borgia had found its way onto stage. (Though why the princesses all shopped at the same store for their outfits I don’t know. The programme credited 40 names responsible for “additional costumes”). The first act was more confused, a real raid on granny’s dressing-up box. The colour combinations and layering of the peasants’ costumes were hard on the eye and obscured the choreography.

No – this production doesn’t work for me, nor did the performances on this occasion. The score was dispatched with band-in-the-park matter-of-factness under Boris Gruzin: none of that heart rending quality that first stirred me, then aged seven, when introduced to the score by an inspirational primary school teacher.

I like the sweep, pace and variety of Bintley’s first act waltz. It has the scale and grandeur that measure up to the music and the size of the stage, in the way that the other ensemble dances (polonaise, Spanish, czardas and mazurka) all do not. Certainly, in among the rag bag of costuming, this year’s waltzers have greater attack and precision than their 1987 counterparts.

Though without any dramatic context, the pas de trois was stylishly delivered by Samantha Raine, Hikaru Kobayashi and especially Sergei Polunin (impatient for his Solor!). Even more delightful were Yuhui Choe and James Wilkie in the Neapolitan (though again, the logic for this number?).

But a Swan Lake lives by its white acts – though not here. The lighting did not help. Patchy, uneven shadows had the effect of accentuating already disparate lines of swans: differences in alignment and placing were shown up. The swan skirts that I particularly liked originally don’t look as subtly realised now. Disregarding the differences in physique, this was an ensemble that did not breathe or move as one. They lacked thrill and terror.

Their swan queen in human form was Alexandra Ansanelli, with David Makhateli as her prince. Both gave accomplished performances, without really finding a spark in each other. I found Ansanelli rather staccato, without much variation between her white and black acts. She had some wonderful arm movements, particularly as she made her exit in act two. Her third act fireworks were very even without being particularly flamboyant.

Makhateli was a very strong and secure partner. Impressive too was the amplitude of his dancing, filling the stage with grandeur and ease. Some very talented soloists in the act one waltz (Whitehead, Stepanek, Kay) but you saw a quality apart when Makhateli joined the waltz. He started his third act solos strongly but without building into a climax. Not that this production provides much context for Siegfried, but best was Makhateli’s acting, utterly rapt and enthralled by his swan, white and black. (And good to see Roland Price credited as a guest teacher on this revival).

So, curiosity satisfied but not a production to which I’ll return. My aberration of a booking this season also includes Bayadere and Manon, neither favourite productions I’ve left alone for a long time. How will they look I wonder?!