The Dream. The Australian Ballet
…c Variations. Monotones II, danced by Natasha Kusen, Brett Simon and Jared Wright, has not really stood the test of time for me. It looked quite outdated and very static. As for Symphonic Variations, could it really be the same ballet I was lucky enough to see in London last year danced by the Royal Ballet? As the curtain went up I got a thrill to see Robyn Hendricks and Cristiano Martino looking stunning as the lead couple—elegant with proud bear…
Giselle. The Australian Ballet (2015)
…Michelle Potter, 16 March 2015 Update (7 April 2015): My review of another Giselle cast, featuring Juliet Burnett and Jared Wright, is at this link….
Dimity Azoury. 2014 Telstra Ballet Dancer Award
…ed on stage at the Sydney Opera House at the final rehearsal for Sir Peter Wright’s Nutcracker. ‘I was in a state of shock when my name was called,’ Azoury says. ‘I was shaking and found it really hard to hold on to the flowers I was given. Then, when the curtain came down, all the dancers hugged me and were so supportive. This is one of the lovely things about working in the Australian Ballet. Everyone is so generous.’ Azoury was trained first in…
Gailene Stock (1946—2014)
…ary Norman whom she married while in Canada. (left) Gailene Stock and Paul Wright in Ballet Imperial, the Australian Ballet, 1967. Photo: Walter Stringer; (right) Gailene Stock before leaving for London, Melbourne 1963. Photo: Keith Byron. Images courtesy of the National Library of Australia. On their return to Australia Stock danced briefly with the Australian Ballet under Anne Woolliams before having her daughter Lisa and then directing the Nati…
The Australian Ballet in 2014
…acMillan’s Manon, which we have seen so many times in Australia, and Peter Wright’s The Nutcracker. I am looking forward to an exciting season in 2014 although I’d rather something other than Manon as a third evening length work. Michelle Potter, 6 September 2013 Here is a is a link to a Houston Ballet preview of Welch’s Bayadère. Watch out for a variation from the Kingdom of the Shades scene danced by Nozomi Iijima. It comes towards the end of th…
Rachel Rawlins retires
…Ty King-Wall, and indeed from Rawlins herself. Rachel Rawlins in Sir Peter Wright’s production of Nutcracker, 2007. Photo: © Justin Smith. Courtesy the Australian Ballet Rachel Rawlins, principal artist with the Australian Ballet, has announced that she will retire at the end of this year. She will give her final performance in Sydney in December in the dual role of Odette/Odile in Stephen Baynes’ newly choreographed version of Swan Lake. ‘I’ve n…
Icons. A second look
…aphy was given great treatment by Leanne Stojmenov, Juliet Burnett, Andrew Wright and Kevin Jackson. While I was attracted by the opening night cast in Melbourne by their cool, technical reading of the work, not to mention their spectacular energy, the cast I saw in Sydney brought a whole new element to it. Not to say that there was not also a strength of technique with this cast—there was—it was beautifully danced by all four. A duet between Stoj…
Dance diary. June 2012
…ure from a vignette by three clowns, Jamie Bretman, Jack Coleman and Simon Wright, who were named in the show as ‘The Clown Kings’. While they had a role throughout the show, including amusing the people standing in the queue to get into the auditorium, I especially loved a sequence in which they performed to the ‘Little Swans’ music from Swan Lake. ‘The Clown Kings’ from Lucy and the lost boy, 2012. Photo: © David Wyatt. Courtesy NICA Meredith…
Pina. A film by Wim Wenders
…ter. For me the most interesting review to date has been by Australian playwright and commentator Louis Nowra. Writing in the August edition of The Monthly, Nowra astutely says, amongst other things, that the scenes shot out of doors are ‘[drained] of their claustrophobic power’, and that ‘the uterine universe that Bausch created onstage is dissipated’. His concluding statement is: ‘For all its 3-D marvels, the film finally doesn’t do her work jus…
The Nutcracker. The Australian Ballet (2010)
…. So it is hardly a surprise that the Australian Ballet’s staging of Peter Wright’s Nutcracker as its final offering for the 2010 Sydney season was a total sell-out. This Nutcracker does not strive too hard for psychological explanations or modernisations and the production has a clear and very welcome logic to it. Nothing happens in the transformation scene, when the Christmas tree grows, mice (rats I think in this production?) emerge and engage…