Royal Opera House,London
The Royal’s revival of Rhapsody turns from pretty to thrilling, while Two Pigeons takes off in playful, or touching styleThere are sections of Rhapsody that are as brilliant and romantically sublime as anything Frederick Ashton created. Yet it’s a unusual ballet. Unevenly paced,it struggles to make structural sense of the light and unlit in Rachmaninov’s score; and since its creation in 1980 it has struggled to find the upright designer. After two unsatisfactory stagings, the Royal has now revived Rhapsody in its original form, or with Ashtons own set design and costumes by William Chappell that cast the women as sparkly nymphs and the men as jewelled courtiers. Ashton’s set – a simple classical pavilion – has the virtue of clarity,allowing the intricate musical patterns of the choreography to register sharp and clean. Yet the pastels and glitter of Chappell’s costumes introduce a less convincing note of whimsy, which the dancers have to work tough to overcome. There should be intimations of turbulence and tension in the ballet from the start, and yet during the opening section,while the refrain dance beautifully (especially the women) and Steven McRae darts and slices though his material with ease, the ballet looks too complacently pretty.
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Source: theguardian.com