Matthew Bourne’s Romeo + Juliet
Sir Matthew Bourne's Romeo + Juliet is an interesting reimagining of the bards iconic love story.
Set in an institute the staging portrays your typical thoughts on an asylum. Victorian Tiled white walls and bright lights. But this does offer some great symbolism and trickery, with the effective lighting casting shadows, and reflections making you wonder if you really saw that or was it a reflection. This all harks back to the feelings of being trapped in an institution as an audience member drawing you into the performance. The shadows act as a fight between reality and thoughts. This is a beautiful yet interesting way to in-still the feelings that young people are experiencing everyday to which was Bourne's primary goal when choreographing Romeo + Juliet as a performance by young dancers.
New Adventures is an iconic British dance-theatre company, that has been Matthew bourne's battle ground for 30 years. He has made them famous for telling stories with a unique theatrical twist. Inspiring and nurturing people of all ages and backgrounds: audiences, artists and the next generation of dancers. Through projects and workshops they have gathered together a cast of talented dancers, choreography associates, set and lighting and sound design.
At each venue of the tour, six young talented dancers have been chosen to perform on stage alongside the professional company. After a series of auditions around the country, the chosen few are workshopped and rehearsed in the performance and how New Adventures unique techniques are developed but also to prepare them for a future of auditions and performances. They blend seamlessly into the show. And you would not know that they had not been touring with the performance for many years.
As well as championing young dancers the show also has a young associate orchestrator and sound designer in Alexander Ling and Rachel Goldberg. The foley sound was thoughtfully introduced and the live orchestra truly uplifted the ballet experience from your traditional tour to as if it was a performance at Sadler's Wells. It is only 15 musicians who perform the score, this is quite rare for New Adventures to take an orchestra out on tour with them, and at times it sounded like there was a full Hallé in the pit. Terry Davies has reimagined Prokofiev's original score but still remained true to the essence of the orchestration. The strong opening of Prokofiev's Montagues and Capulets which was continuously returned to and adapted at various moments in the performances, created a backdrop for the dancers to depict the drama of Shakespeare without the need for words.
The dancers themselves were completely stunning. With grace and poise, they at times float around the stage, with the stamina of a marathon runner, they work as an ensemble and portray feelings of love and grief with utter credence.
Cordila Braithwaite as Juliet and Paris Fitzpatrick as Romeo are a standout pairing and blend seamlessly into each other at moments.
Hannah Mason also stood out and is certainly someone to watch in future.
Dan Wright as Tybalt the guard offered experience and dominance over the younger dancers both in stature and performance. The pairing of Mercutio and his boyfriend Balthasar in Reece Causton and Jackson Fisch was inspired and draws the ballet into the modern age by exploring sexuality and emotion through the pair. Jackson's depiction of grief at Mecutio's death is powerful.
All this said the story of warring families separating a pair of star crossed lovers does seem lost. It appears more to be the young against the institution, the fight against the misguided authority who through abuse of power seek to keep the young down. No lesson seems learnt from the untimely death of the young protagonists, just the mental anguish of a young woman who's frenzy leads to the death of her love and herself. The battle of mental health against feelings and the actions of others against a system that does not want you to explore them.
4 stars.
.Originally reviewed for Frankly my dear UK.
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