Royal Ballet Triple Bill
Royal Opera House
The nurturing of home-grown choreographic talent has always played a central role in the history of the Royal Ballet. Undaunted by the possible ups and downs of the experimental approach, Ninette de Valois, the company’s founder, set up a unique platform for budding dance-makers. True, not everything was a success and not everything stood the test of time; but, had it not been for her risk-taking, modern-dance history would have suffered a great deal. Against the pressures and the fashionable trends of today’s ‘artistic globalisation’, which prescribes the import/export of a universally adaptable prêt à porter kind of choreography, the company has long remained faithful to the principles of its creator. Experimentation happens at different levels and is carefully monitored through well-established patterns; long before hitting the main stage, new dance-makers are invited to present their works within specifically supportive contexts, such as the events hosted in either the Clore Studio Upstairs or the Linbury Theatre. Yet it would be a mistake to expect that such carefully monitored progression guarantees the success of the works that finally make it to the big stage, or that whoever has a work premièred by the company is the much-sought-after ‘next one’ — as the making of a choreographic genius relies on other and often unpredictable factors.
This is the spirit in which, I believe, one ought to attend the current triple bill, which includes Jonathan Watkins’s new work As One. Brought up artistically within the company, Watkins has had a fairly consistent string of successes with a number of works shown in both the Clore and the Linbury. As One draws upon a favourite theme of his — namely, the study of human behaviour, which he first approached with promising results in a student work based on Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-four.
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in