How much weight of plot can dance carry? Balanchine famously insisted that there are no mothers-in-law in ballet, and masters such as Fokine, Massine and Ashton largely confined the dimensions of their narratives to the back of a postage stamp. Yet in A Month in the Country Ashton also proved that ballet can communicate delicate nuances of psychology; MacMillan’s Mayerling has a complex historical-political setting that fascinates; and Matthew Bourne has devised a cartoon-ish mode of silent tale-telling that has proved very popular and effective.
Although one could multiply these examples, the fact remains that plot-driven ballet is a tricky business: stories develop more naturally through words than images and too often dance doesn’t provide enough compensation for their absence. Adapting a novel is probably going to lose more than it gains; and it is a bold man who thinks that he can improve on Shakespeare.
Christopher Wheeldon – a likeable, talented, productive choreographer and a fine craftsman of abstract scenarios – has had a stab at both these challenges, and I think he has failed.
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