Review: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Delve into the sublime, surreal and a little bit sexy this Halloween with the Royal New Zealand Ballet’s rebirth of their iconic ballet A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
A co-production with the Queensland Ballet and first performed in 2015, this stunning performance combines the late Liam Scarlett’s choreography with Felix Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream score to create something truly magical.
The Shakespearean A Midsummer Night’s Dream is probably fairly well-known to most of you but if it’s not, here’s a précis. Powerful fairies in a forest take an interest in human love affairs, there’s some capering and cases of mistaken identity, a man gets turned into a donkey, and all works out well in the end.
It’s a wonderful play, though narratively complex. The RNZB’s iteration takes this iconic story and streamlines it, setting it entirely within the forest and cutting some of the smaller characters, to its absolute benefit. You don’t need to be bogged down in the affairs of a human queen and king when you’ve got a fairy queen and king to worry about – for example.
When my ballet-going companion and I enter the St James, we’re immediately wowed by the set – surely one of the RNZB’s best. A multileveled set, with pieces that can fly and incremental lighting states, build a picture of a forest – it’s stunning and clever in its versatility. (Tracy Grant Lord).
We step into the story with a fight between fairy Queen and King Titania (Ana Gallardo Lobaina) and Oberon (Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson). They’re fighting over a changling child, who is played adorably by a child dancer, Anja Carr, dressed in a purple onesie. The fight turns sour and the pair fall apart, with Oberon swearing revenge.
A group of explorers and hikers find themselves in the forest the same night. Part of this group are our four lovers, Hermia (Mayu Tanigaito), Lysander (Kihiro Kusukami), Hestia (Kirby Selchow) and Demetrius (Zacharie Dun). They are in a challenging romantic quadrangle, which gets even more ridiculous when the fairies decide to intervene.
Oberon and his mischievous companion Puck (Shaun James Kelly), use a magical flower to make Titania fall in love with Bottom (Calum Gray) one of the explorers, who is transformed into a donkey. They also intervene within the above love quadrangle, to disastrous and hilarious results.
Look, it’s a fabulous ballet. That’s a given with the RNZB; but what I especially appreciated about this one is the multi-layered and intricate diversity of the dance within, which steps far beyond ballet you’re used to.
The four lovers have a deliriously funny dance fight, the male ensemble (styled very much like characters from Wes Anderson’s oeurve) a bold and very silly group number, Oberon and Titania dance a beautiful (and a little spicy) pas de deux, and then there’s also a variety of more subtle and sweet romantic numbers.
I especially love how the RNZB, and Liam Scarlett’s choreography, hasn’t been afraid to lean into the sexy and surreal. The story is a strange one, and at times very flirtatious, which ballet can sometimes shy from, but this staging is bold, oftentimes blossoming with ridiculousness (Calum Gray’s donkey performance is wonderful) much to its benefit.
Puck, who has always been my favourite ever since I first knew the play, floats high above the stage (quite literally at one point), flitting between dance moments and causing chaos. Shaun James Kelly has mastered this role – a truly fantastic iteration of a character people know well – and is a wonder to watch throughout the ballet.
Such can be said for all the performers, though. A Midsummer Night’s Dream is almost entirely note-perfect, a deeply welcome adaptation, and so much of that is down to the strength of the dancers, the incredible world they’ve built and the orchestral accompaniment. It’s a truly magical work, and a beautiful taster if you’re new to the world of Shakespeare, or even the world of ballet itself. You don’t want to miss this.
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