When Carlos Acosta took over as artistic director at Birmingham Royal Ballet in January, this was not the inaugural year he had in mind. Acosta’s troupe is set to be the first UK ballet company to stage a live performance post-lockdown, with a premiere in October. In the meantime, however, there is a chance to watch something from the archive, David Bintley’s Cinderella from 2010.
While Acosta plans to drive his company forward into fresh territory, this is very much the BRB of old, a familiar treatment of a well-known story, Bintley’s skilful but safe choreography, and long-time (now retired) principals Elisha Willis and Iain Mackay in the leads. There’s nothing wrong with all that, of course. We could all do with some fairytale escapism right now, and there’s magic here, especially in designer John Macfarlane’s backdrops of star-strewn solar systems – when Cinderella makes her arresting entrance at the ball it’s as if she has descended from the heavens.
Before that, banished to the cold, grey cellar kitchen, Willis’s Cinders lives a grim existence, yet she emanates light and sweetness despite it all. Barefoot, dancing with the childlike spirit of one carried away by the music, while being utterly on top of the choreography’s technical demands, Willis shows us Cinderella retreating into her imagination, living a fantasy life in parallel with the drudgery.
Cinderella’s radiant transformation is a magnet to Mackay’s capably dashing prince. Their initial connection is less a personal, emotional one, more like looking in a mirror and seeing your own shining perfection reflected back at you, but their third-act reunion brings more sensitivity. There’s fine dancing and broad caricature from the supporting cast – although this is far from the most OTT Cinderella out there. The ugly sisters, Skinny and Dumpy? Well, you’ve seen this bad-dancing shtick before – and nobody did it better than French and Saunders – but Marion Tait’s stepmother is deliciously sour, her face permanently pinched and pursed. Plus there are dancing mice, frogs and lizards, and Prokofiev’s fantastic score, related in many ways to his masterpiece Romeo and Juliet, packed with melody, character and the occasional ominous undertow.
Ultimately there’s nothing surprising or unsettling here, which may be exactly the right prescription.
