Music
Sergei Prokofiev
Scottish Ballet and Orchestra
Choreography
Ashley Page
Designs
Antony McDonald
Conducter
Nicholas Kok
Cinderella
Claire Robertson
Prince
Erik Cavallari
Godmother
Soon Ja Lee
Father
Jarkko Lehmus
Stepmother
Eve Mutso
Stepsisters
Patricia Hines
and Diana Loosmore
Equerry
Glauco di Liryo
Dancing Master
Paul Liburd
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Cinderella
Sadler's Wells
14 - 18 March 2006
Exciting times for the Scottish Ballet after the contentious appointment of Ashley Page as Artistic Director three and a half years ago. For the first nine months of his tenure, the company were subjected to rigororous retraining to bring them out of the doldrums, before they were allowed back on stage. Rewarded in 2005 with their first invitation to perform at the Edinburgh Festival in twenty years, they have now debuted at Sadlers Wells in a handsome new reworking of Cinderella conceived by Page and Antony McDonald.
Prokoviev was commissioned by the Kirov Ballet to compose Cinderella to a scenario by Nicolai Volkov in 1944, after Perrault's popular fairy tale. It might be based on a classic, but there was nothing pedestrian about the look of the latest version (programme notes which name-checked Andy Warhol and Vivienne Westwood gave an early indication of this) for it was a riot of poster-paint scenery and punk couture.
McDonald dressed his stage to resemble a toytown version of an eighteenth century chateau at the onset. Cinderella's extended family receive their invitations to the palace ball at the hands of the Equerry accompanied by a Dancing Master. The latter, pranced enthusiastically by (leopardskin-clad) Paul Liburd; along with Eve Mutso's elegantly-pointed stepmother (in Schiparelli pink); proved outstanding movers in this scene. While all eyes were on them performing solo; once the ensemble were fully engaged, the action verged on the chaotic and it was every man for himself. Later, a fluid Soon Ja Lee as the fairy godmother transported us to a secret garden behind the fireplace where four acrobatic elementals representing the seasons delight with their individual displays. Claire Robertson's pin-neat ragamuffin of a Cinderella, prepares for the ball in the company of a spritely crew of clock 'Cogs': dancers symbolising the importance of time and the midnight curfew. These synchonised belles, ravishing in monochrome tutus, were particularly well aligned and performed in total accord whenever they appeared.
The heroine alights from her quaint pumpkin-balloon into the crepescular formal garden (soon to be magically illuminated) and at last meets her Prince, a striking Erik Cavalleri with the profile of a young byzantine potentate. Cavalleri is a muscular, accomplished dancer, but he has two problems. Firstly, it is difficult to believe that he is seeking a wife at all, when every male on stage (Liburd being the chief culprit) is hell-bent on flirting with him or each other. Page should dilute this campness, for it can be intrusive and suggests a pantomime-dame humour which ill becomes Prokofiev's haunting score. Secondly, Cavalleri is in a different league to his paramour, for Robertson lacks charisma and alas, looks less fetching when painted and be-gowned for the ball than she does au naturel. Her dancing is more than adequate, but fails to shine beside Mutso's archly stunning turn as the villain of the piece. The young couple's pas de deux is eminently watchable, it is just that the princely solo excels - even if the hero's forehead was beaded with less than regal perspiration. The composer's percussion strike midnight, and Cinderella attempts to escape past courtiers clad in gaudy crinolines, jewelled tailcoats and variegated wigs. This scene worked particularly well and was one the ballet's highlights.
An earth garlanded with playing cards forms the painterly backdrop to Act III, a symbol one imagines for the vagaries of fate. Against all odds, the prince matches the slipper to his inamorata, while her stepmother and two lumpen daughters - eyes pecked out by doves - meet their comeuppance. Page's Cinderella is much more than the sum of its flawed parts. The male coryphees might benefit from more manliness, but they danced a treat. Similarly, the ballerinas - Seasons, Princesses and especially, Cogs - were uniformly of a high standard and what star quality the production's female principal lacked, her regal suitor and fashion-plate of a stepmother made up for. A stellar evening - recommended. Caroline Kellett Fraysse
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