dance
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and supportFriday, 14 November 2025
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Quadrophenia, Sadler's Wells review - missed opportunity to give new stage life to a Who classicMonday, 30 June 2025
The red, white and blue bull’s-eye on the front curtain at Sadler’s Wells tells us we are in the familiar territory of Pete Townshend’s rock musical about teenage angst in 1960s Britain. What follows isn’t so easy to recognise. Read more... |
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The Midnight Bell, Sadler's Wells review - a first reprise for one of Matthew Bourne's most compelling shows to dateThursday, 19 June 2025
Rarely has a revival given a firmer thumbs-up for the future of dance-theatre. Yet Matthew Bourne’s latest show, first aired at the tail-end of lockdown, is far from being a high-octane people-pleaser. It won’t send its audience out teary-eyed and shaken as his Swan Lake did and continues to do. Read more... |
Ballet to Broadway: Wheeldon Works, Royal Ballet review - the impressive range and reach of Christopher Wheeldon's craftMonday, 19 May 2025
Ballet is hardly a stranger to Broadway. Until the late 1950s every other musical had its fantasy ballet sequence – think Cyd Charisse in Singin’ in the Rain, or Laurey’s dream in Oklahoma!, whose first interpreter was its choreographer Agnes de Mille. Read more... |
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The Forsythe Programme, English National Ballet review - brains, beauty and bravuraTuesday, 15 April 2025
It’s hard to think of anyone even half as persistent as William Forsythe in changing the conversation around ballet. The American choreographer first came to notice with what became the defining dancework of the late 1980s. Read more... |
Sad Book, Hackney Empire review - What we feel, what we show, and the many ways we deal with sadnessFriday, 11 April 2025
Who goes to the theatre to feel sad? That is, knowing full well that they won’t be going home with a skip in their step. Many people, it would appear, given the success of a small touring dance show based on a book by the poet and broadcaster Michael Rosen. Read more... |
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Balanchine: Three Signature Works, Royal Ballet review - exuberant, joyful, exhilaratingTuesday, 01 April 2025
Is the Royal Ballet a “Balanchine company”? The question was posed at a recent Insight evening to Patricia Neary, the tireless dancer who has helped keep the choreographer’s legacy intact since his death in 1983 and a living link with his teaching. Neary has been working with the RB as a coach, advisor and stager of Balanchine’s work for the past 57 years. “Oh yes!” was her emphatic answer. Read more... |
Romeo and Juliet, Royal Ballet review - Shakespeare without the words, with music to die forThursday, 20 March 2025
1965 was a year of change in Britain. It saw the abolition of the death penalty and the arrival of the Race Relations Act. It was the year of the Mary Quant miniskirt and “Satisfaction” by The Rolling Stones. While cinema-goers queued around the block to see The Sound of Music (a critical flop), the Royal Opera House had another kind of hit on its hands. Read more... |
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Help to give theartsdesk a future!Saturday, 01 March 2025
It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com. It followed some hectic and intensive months when a disparate and eclectic team of arts and culture writers went ahead with an ambitious plan – to launch a dedicated internet site devoted to coverage of the UK arts scene. Read more... |
Light of Passage, Royal Ballet review - Crystal Pite’s cosmic triptych powers backFriday, 21 February 2025
“Cry sorrow, sorrow, but let the good prevail”. The refrain of Aeschylus’s chorus near the start of the Oresteia is alive and honoured in Henryk Górecki’s rhetoric-free symphonic memorial and Crystal Pite’s response to the dynamism under its seemingly static surface. 44 dancers of all ages, soprano, orchestra and design all work towards a timeless work of art, resonating now but bound to hold up in whatever future remains to us. Read more... |
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