Tag: Alice in Wonderland

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Alice in Wonderland and Twitterland

 

Photo of Lauren Cuthbertson as Alice, by Johan Persson of the Royal Ballet, taken from here.

Christopher Wheeldon’s Alice in Wonderland premiered tonight at the Royal Ballet in London. BalletNews has already posted a detailed review. And the Ballet Bag ladies live-tweeted the event on behalf of the Royal. They had backstage privileges and were privy to all kinds of insider info so definitely check out the hashtag they tweeted under, #AliceInWonderland – they’ve got pictures, reviews, etc. etc. I was also told NYCB’s Maria Kowroski was in attendance. I’m currently searching the hashtag tweets for the photo of her.

I’ve been really excited about this ballet since I first heard about it. Can’t wait for it to tour!

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NO IT’S NOT THE TOE SHOES, CHRISTOPHER WHEELDON!

 

Here’s a Sarah Crompton interview with Christopher Wheedon in the London Telegraph. Morphoses is about to open their fall season there, debuting a new ballet by Wheeldon and one by Australian choreographer Tim Harbour. At the end of the month, New York audiences will get to see those premieres.

In the article, Wheeldon talks about trying to increase ballet’s appeal to new audiences. He surmises it may be certain ballet aesthetics, such as the toe shoes, that are a turn-off, that may make ballet inaccessible. I strongly disagree though. I think people are generally awed by the toe shoes and by the beauty and immense athleticism of the art form. They’re all the more awe-inspiring when you see them up close, a thought I had recently in the Guggenheim’s tiny theater watching ABT, their studio company, and the students at ABT’s Kennedy-Onassis School of Ballet perform in a Works & Process event there.

I really think people in general are drawn to stories. That’s what I hear anyway from other dance-goers, or would-be dance-goers (who patronize theater and opera but shy away from dance). I think abstract ballets can definitely be intriguing but I think if your repertoire consists of only the kind of story-less ballets Balanchine made it’s going to suffer. I’ll be very excited to see the Alice in Wonderland that Wheeldon’s doing for the Royal.

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WHEELDON IN WONDERLAND

 

So London is abuzz about the Royal’s official announcement that Christopher Wheeldon will make a full-length ballet based on Alice in Wonderland, set to premiere in 2011.

I’m excited, especially since some of my favorites of his have been his more dramatic ballets, like The Nightingale and the Rose. Thankfully, he doesn’t plan to make a children’s ballet: “A lot can be read into Alice in Wonderland. One could take the more Freudian route…” he says.

Critics expect Wheeldon to “bring a sophistication and an understanding of the darker sides of the text.”

Music will be by Joby Talbot, whose work he also used for the mysterious, poetic Fool’s Paradise, which makes me all the more intrigued.