Swan Lake revisited. Royal New Zealand Ballet

Production by Russell Kerr, staged by Turid Revfeim—alternate casts in continuing Wellington season
reviewed by Jennifer Shennan

I have been privileged to see the three casts of the Wellington season of Swan Lake, in Russell Kerr’s pedigree production (and note there is also a fourth cast, though not performing in the capital). It’s impressive that a relatively small ballet company can field that number of Principals since ours is half or a quarter the size of major world companies who would stage a Swan Lake.

We might also score as the world’s most widely nationally touring company. That dates back to 1950s when Poul Gnatt took ballet to 156 towns throughout the country each year. In part the geography of Aotearoa New Zealand allowed that, provided you could find the stamina, but it was also Gnatt’s intent to take ballet to the people, to the farming community, to schools, to local towns where billets were forthcoming and the provision of suppers became a thing of some local competition—in contrast with his own homeland where people had to travel to Copenhagen to see their national company. Gnatt’s vision seems to have worked since sell-out shows of Swan Lake around the country are still happening, and the zeitgeist of the Company today is causally connected to those beginnings.

I said in my review of this production’s opening night that the corps de ballet of swans are making a particularly beautiful line-up, and that is impressive since most of them would not have danced Swan Lake before. Also noteworthy is that none of the Odette/Odile-Siegfried casts has ever danced these full-length roles before either. And what’s more you can spy last night’s Swan Queen in the line-up of Princesses dancing at court tonight, and here amongst the corps de ballet tonight, as a fragile and beautiful but anonymous swan, is tomorrow’s Odette/Odile. Perhaps it is the freshness of so many premiere performances that is contributing to the rich and committed quality of this production. That, and the staging by Turid Revfeim.

Ana Gallardo Lobaina and Joshusa Guillemot-Rodgerson with corps de ballet and von Rothbart in *Swan Lake*. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2024. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Kate Kadow as the Swan Queen uses her statuesque physique to real effect and gives a striking performance particularly as Odile. Her Siegfried, Branden Rainers, is a strong and secure partner.

Ana Gallardo Lobaina and Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson make another fine pairing in the title roles, again spectacular in the Odile-Siegfried liaison. The solo of the melancholy prince alone on stage between acts is a poignant and beautiful performance I will long remember.

Ana Gallardo Lobaina as Odile and Joshusa Guillemot-Rodgerson as Siegfried in *Swan Lake*, Act III. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2024. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

It is quite a moment when after the matinee performance Ty King-Wall, the Company’s artistic director, takes the stage to announce that both Ana Gallardo Lobaina and Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson are being promoted to the rank of Principal.

A ballet stage is usually full of beautiful things many, many times rehearsed and then impeccably delivered. Improvisation and spontaneity are not normally on offer, so it is quite wonderful to watch Gallardo Lobaina overwhelmed at the surprise announcement. ‘Is she laughing or crying’ is the 4 year old’s urgent whisper beside me in the dark. The answer is ‘yes’ since she is a quivering, laughing, crying dancer who hasn’t rehearsed this bit, but eventually, after several minutes, finds a fist punch to say ‘OK. Yes. I accept.’

The Jester in that cast, Dane Head, is a truly mischievous character with impeccable timing throughout (echoes of a Mercutio or a Harlequin in some other ballet). Von Rothbart, here played by Zacharie Dun, also has the week’s edge of that role in his scheming duplicity and evil intent (reminding me of the Devil in Denis Potter’s Brimstone and Treacle, that tour de force of the theatre). Paul Mathews, returning from retirement to play the somewhat bumbling old Tutor Wolfgang, of course wears the same costume by Kristian Fredrikson as did the late Jon Trimmer who created the role, and we welcome the reminder of that.

Russell Kerr’s catch-cry was always ‘There’s no such thing as a small part’ and that would explain why every performer in his productions makes the stage their own. The Spanish, Hungarian and Italian entertainers at court, in von Rothbart’s thrall, are delivered with exceptional panache. Catarina Estevez-Collins has a stand-out quality, but it’s always Kirby Selchow who steals my eye. She is the character who acts before she dances, whereas in ballet is mostly the other way round. Calum Gray continues to impress, and he will likely be a Siegfried in years to come.

Katherine Minor, the ‘fourth’ Odette/Odile (with Kihiro Kusukami as Siegfried) is the cast I didn’t see. Minor is in the corps of swans each night in Wellington, they are all immaculate and identical but there’s an aura of Olga Spessivtseva about Minor that uncannily marks her out from the rest (and what’s more she is a dead ringer lookalike of former Royal New Zealand Ballet dancer, Fiona Tonkin— now there’s New Zealand ballet history for you).

We have already seen Minor as Odile in a recent Tutus on Tour program so we know she can do it, but it’s always the matter of how evenly and convincingly Odette and Odile will play off the double sides of that single role that takes us back to the next performance. In this season and by my reading, it is Mayu Tanigaito who plays both aspects equally and deeply, right from the get-go—the subtle and anguished Odette, equally with the sparklingly duplicit Odile (possibly the somewhat ‘easier’ role to smash out? Who knows? Ask the dancers). Tanigaito appears as each of these persona before she even starts dancing. How that mystery, that alchemy works is another reason we go back to the ballet. So sadly, I’ll just have to imagine how Minor is playing out her double character in the role of a lifetime.

Of course, what Swan Lake is ‘really about’ is the emotional stamina required to continue living when your beloved partner has had to leave—in other words, it’s an essay on grief, how to live with the memory of someone after von Rothbart has stolen her away. That’s ‘really’ why we go to back to see Swan Lake, and why Russell Kerr’s quiet mastering of the layered and ambiguous ending is so very consoling, so very finely wrought.

Jennifer Shennan, 12 May 2024

Featured image: Kate Kadow as Odile with Branden Reiners as Siegfried in Swan Lake Act III. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2024. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Swan Lake. Royal New Zealand Ballet

1 May 2024 (and following national tour). St James Theatre, Wellington
reviewed by Jennifer Shennan

This pedigree production of Swan Lake by Russell Kerr, the beloved father figure of ballet in New Zealand, was first staged on the company in 1996 and again in 2002, 2007 and 2013. Russell Kerr died in 2022 so this re-staging is the first not under his direction.

It proves a triumph on several levels, and is giving many a balletomane a sense of coming home. To some degree that involves the sumptuous sets and distinctive costumes by designer Kristian Fredrikson, which still carry as well as they did nigh on three decades ago. The cut and the cloth, the colours, weight and scale of all of Fredrikson’s work come from a singular vision.

Mayu Tanigaito as Odette/Odile can trust her formidable technique to release an exquisite interpretation of the dual role. She conveys Odette’s yearning through superb control of port de bras, unfolding arabesques and in the beautifully held balances, which could have lasted even longer, holding her breath and ours. But after a hint of rubato with the masterful conductor Hamish McKeich holding the baton, you have to go where the stunningly beautiful violin solo, played by Donald Armstrong, is leading you. The pathos of doomed love and Odette’s courage to protect both the Prince, and her fellow victims, is rendered with a tenderness that was in splendid contrast with her sparkling duplicity as Odile. Pearl then diamond.

Mayu Tanigaito as Odette and Laurynas Vejalis as Siegfried in *Swan Lake*, Act II. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2024. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Laurynas Vejalis is a pensive Prince Siegfried, and I appreciate enormously the aesthetic restraint that he brings to his phenomenal technique. As a dancer he can do anything, as Siegfried he holds back, until he sights Odile that is. As the four-act ballet progresses this couple perform some of the finest pas de deux we have seen here in recent years.

The ensemble of swans is impressive, many of them younger dancers who will be performing in their first Swan Lake. They may have missed Russell Kerr but they could not have a better introduction than this beautifully realised production. Character dances in the ballroom scene are very stylishly delivered and help build a rich and royal courtly atmosphere, all the more devastating when it falls out of the vertical and collapses into chaos. Von Rothbart wears the most magnificent cloak in history but I felt the mysterious and evil intent of his complex role could have been more convincingly conveyed.

Catarina Estévez-Collins and Monet Galea-Hewitt, with corps de ballet, as Swans in *Swan Lake* Act II. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2024. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Kerr’s production lifts Tchaikovsky’s sublime composition off the page and onto the stage, and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra play superbly, with a number of fine players evident in the solos. The different sections of the orchestra are alive to the drama of lyrical and haunting or tempestuous and extrovert passages. Hamish McKeich holds it all together and the triumph belongs equally to him.

Much credit is due to the Company’s new artistic directorate for appointing Turid Revfeim as regisseur of Russell Kerr’s production. Revfeim is another of the country’s ballet legends—an accomplished dancer, teacher and artistic director of an independent ballet collective, a long-standing professional of great stamina and skilled diplomacy. Having worked with Kerr for years she is the perfect person for the job. The modesty apparent in her curtain-call speaks volumes, but as Edmund Hilary would say she ‘has an awful lot to be modest about’. Her program essay reminisces about Kerr’s inimitable way of working, and the high expectations he had of each dancer.

It is good too to be reminded of Shannon Dawson’s words about Kerr … ‘He is a parent of sorts, a father of dance, teaching the young, guiding the teenager and letting the adult go free, and the only thing expected in return is that you do your best.’

Kerr’s own insightful essay in the printed program proclaims ‘There are no swans in the ballet Swan Lake…’ explaining they are all women…’victims of an evil genius’. His reading offers an ambiguous ending to the ballet, suggesting that von Rothbart as the power of evil has been overcome, but perhaps only temporarily? Swan and Prince are together, but the misogynist magician will be back. He was conquered once, for now, but there may come a need to conquer him again. The resourceful lighting design by Jon Buswell contributes much here.

Branden Reiners as von Rothbart in *Swan Lake.* Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2024. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Jennifer Shennan, 3 May 2024

Featured image: Mayu Tanigaito as Odile and Laurynas Vejalis as Siegfried in Swan Lake, Act III. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2024. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Russell Kerr Lecture, 2024

The paper below was meant to be given as a talk as part of the 2024 Russell Kerr Lecture series, which took place in Wellington on 25 February 2024. I had a misadventure with the plane that took me to Wellington (which ended up in Auckland) and in the end did not get to Wellington to deliver the talk in person. Here is a slightly altered version of what I planned to say.

Unlike many of you here I was not a close friend of, or fellow performer with Jon Trimmer. My connection came as a result of a book I was researching about designer Kristian Fredrikson, who was a New Zealander by birth and who designed a number of works for Royal New Zealand Ballet and other New Zealand-based companies. Kristian, of course, came into contact with Jonty over and over. I first met Jonty in 2018 and spent a remarkable hour or so drinking coffee and listening to his recollections of Kristian. (And I should add here that I am calling him Jonty because he said I could when we met.)

My talk today will focus on a few of the productions that Kristian designed and in which Jonty appeared. Given the short amount of time I have, it will only be a few I’m afraid. First up is Peter Pan, a work choreographed by none other than Russell Kerr. It premiered in 1999 and Jonty had the role of Captain Hook. The image below is a special study made by Kristian for Marjorie Head. Marjorie was an admired Australian milliner and worked closely with Kristian for many, many years. He made a number of special designs for her as gifts for various occasions and six of them are now in the collection of the National Library in Canberra. What you see is one of them.

Below are two action shots from a performance of Peter Pan. Jonty loved this role and during our conversation said the words you see on the left hand side of the image, ‘I adored it. I had lovely shoes with nice heels and big bows at the front. It was cabaret style stuff. If I could still do it I’d love to be in it again.’ (Jon Trimmer, 2018)

But what is clear in these two photographs is how strongly he entered into a role. You can see it in his body, whether he is leaning forward or throwing his arms upwards. Each expresses a different emotion through his body and, of course, in his facial expression.

Below are two more performance shots from Peter Pan and the same may be said of them. The slightly concerned look on his face on the left-hand image contrasts with the pirately involvement we see in the right-hand image. Oh, those eyes! And that mouth! You can read what Jonty said of his costume on the slide or here, ‘My Captain Hook jacket was so heavy. I had a lot of running around to do and after the first tour Kristian put together a lighter jacket. It looked the same but was just made out of lighter fabric.’ (Jon Trimmer, 2018)

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I’m moving on now to A Servant of Two Masters, a ballet choreographed by Gray Veredon based on a play of the same name by 18th century Venetian playwright Carlo Goldoni.

Jonty, whom you see on the right of the image, played the rich merchant Pantalone. This particular slide shows something of the set design and I found researching the set design quite interesting. No time here to go into it, other than to present what Cathy Goss, who danced in various roles in the show, had to say, ‘I remember the silks and I think we all had a love/hate relationship with them! There were quite complex sequences to get right each night and a fair bit of sitting holding them as they basically created the set at times.’ (Catherine Goss, 2018)

And above we see Jonty with Harry Haythorne as Dr Lombardi engaging in a somewhat dramatic moment. And notice the rather taken aback look on Jonty’s face and his curved body as he attempts to manage the somewhat dominant Lombardi. You can read what Jonty says about the costume in the text on the screen, and here, ‘I had long-johns on, bright red, quite tight, and a lovely jacket in multi colours. Harry had black long-johns, slightly baggier, and a long red and white striped scarf.’ (Jon Trimmer, 2018).

And just as an aside, I found on Wikipedia the small image at the corner of the slide. The image is from Frenchman Maurice Sand and shows Pantalone as he appeared as an Italian commedia dell arte figure. So, the red that Jonty talks about is clearly looking back to the original Pantalone.

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So, I’m moving on now to Tell me a Tale, Gray Veredon’s work of 1989 in which Jonty played the Teller of Tales.

I was fascinated when I discovered the design you see on the screen – a very Australian coat, a Driza-Bone to give it its name, and Jonty refers the Teller of Tales as ‘A really outback character.’ I’m not sure if outback is also a New Zealand expression but it is very Australian referring to the land beyond the cities and the regional town areas. But if I had looked closely at the design, I would have perhaps noticed that there was a decorative element on the hat. Andrew Pfeiffer mentioned it in a talk I had with him in 2012. He said, ‘Jon was dressed in a Driza-Bone with a bit of silver fern wrapped through his hat and that emblem printed all over the top of his Driza-Bone.’ (Andrew Pfeiffer, 2012)

Andrew also summarised the story in a few words saying, ‘It was basically a storyteller telling a young boy the story of New Zealand in terms of the relationships between the Māori people and the colonists. Jonty was often just standing there with a young boy sitting at his feet. He was miming to the boy throughout the ballet with the ballet taking place on the side.’ (Andrew Pfeiffer, 2012)

And Gray tells the story of how it came to be called Tell Me a Tale.

I should add though that Gray starts by saying ‘Living there … ‘. ‘There’ refers to Katikati where he grew up.

Andrew Pfeiffer also helped me with something else, although I didn’t realise it until I was preparing this talk and I went back to the recording I had of our conversation in 2012. During my research I found a design in the National Library that was not identified. You can see it on the right of the screen. It was located in a box close to the costume designs for Tell Me a Tale and I wondered if it was a set design. In our interview, Andrew mentioned that Jonty was standing in front of some sails. So, with apologies to the photographer, I made some alterations to the image on the slide above – exposure, colour etc – and there they were, the sails. They are hard to see with the image transferred to this website but you can just make them out on the image below in the top right-hand corner.

But going back after that slight diversion, I think the main image on this slide shows Jonty again using all his body as he leans back and looks ahead at what will unfold. Elsewhere in the interview I did with Gray he says. ‘I wanted to look back to where I came from’ and I think we can definitely see that in Jonty’s posture and expression. And we can see a similar sense of seeking and searching in Kim Broad as the young boy.

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Going on now to Russell Kerr’s Swan Lake. I haven’t added a date to the heading for this slide as the work has been revived on a number of occasions. The premiere occurred in 1996 but the image I have of Jonty, as Wolfgang the tutor to Siegfried, comes from a performance in 2005. In the centre of the slide is Kristian Fredrikson’s design for Wolfgang’s costume.

And below is the full image from which the figure of Jonty in the slide above has been extracted. You can’t help but be taken aback somewhat by the magnificence of the costume for the Princess Mother of course but I love this photo of Jonty because he is the tutor, she is the Princess Mother and, while he is dressed to kill, I think you can see in his downcast eyes, his carefully folded arms and hands and his very erect posture that he knows his place in the scheme of things, and in the society in which ballet takes place.

That is all I have time for so I am back now with the first image I showed. What I set out to suggest in this talk is that Jonty did open the door for us and he kept us there with the way he performed. It was not just through his technique but also through his being able to enter into the characters he was taking on in other ways as well, through his physicality and his understanding that characterisation is enhanced by every aspect of movement.

Michelle Potter, 31 March 2024

Dance diary. February 2024

Russell Kerr Lecture 2024

The annual Russell Kerr Lecture for 2024 took place in Wellington on Sunday 25 February. The lecture honoured Sir Jon Trimmer, esteemed artist who made a huge contribution to ballet in New Zealand, and who died last year. I was to give a short talk in which I planned, by focusing on images including some costume designs, to show how Jonty, as he was familiarly known, was able to inhabit a role so magnificently. Unfortunately there was an issue with the plane that was taking me to Wellington from Sydney late on Saturday. The issue was not so much the plane itself but the weather in Wellington as we attempted to land. We were in fact diverted to Auckland (at around midnight) and a situation developed where we were told to wait in the transit lounge until the plane could take off to Wellington (the next morning). Well, without going into the highly unpleasant details, I ended up flying back to Sydney on the Sunday thus missing the lecture!

One of the most interesting parts of the proposed talk, at least for me, concerned a work called Tell Me a Tale choreographed by Gray Veredon in 1988 in which Jonty played the role of the Teller of Tales. In an interview I did with Jonty in 2018 he told me he was ‘a really “outback” character’ in the work. In a earlier interview (2012) with Royal New Zealand Ballet’s former wardrobe manager, Andrew Pfeiffer, I heard that ‘Jon was dressed in a Driza-Bone with a bit of silver fern wrapped through his hat and that emblem printed all over the top of his Driza-Bone.’ Below is Kristian Fredrikson’s design for the Teller of Tales alongside a photo of Jonty dressed in that outfit.

Andrew Pfeiffer also gave a very succinct outline of the story saying, ‘It was basically a storyteller telling a young boy the story of New Zealand in terms of the relationships between the Māori people and the colonists. Jonty was often just standing there with a young boy sitting at his feet. He was miming to the boy throughout the ballet with the ballet taking place on the side.’

And another aspect of that part of my talk was Veredon’s discussion of how the work came to be called Tell Me a Tale. Here is the audio link:

I was really disappointed not to have been able to give the talk and may work out later how to add the PPT to this site.

Hannah O’Neill

It is always good to hear about Hannah O’Neill’s ongoing success with Paris Opera Ballet. Here is a link to the latest news.

Lifeline Book Fair Canberra

The Lifeline Book Fair is a regular event in Canberra and has been for many years now. The most recent fair was in February 2024 and I ended up with seven dance-related items even though I had decided I have enough dance books for the rest of my life and wasn’t intending to buy anything this time. All in all the seven items cost me $27, which will go to helping Lifeline Canberra keep its crisis telephone service operating in the local area. I am currently reading the autobiographical I, Maya Plistetskaya, perhaps the most unusually written book I have ever come across. Next on the list is The Official Bolshoi Ballet Book of Swan Lake by Yuri Grigorovich and Alexander Demidov, whose chapters include ‘The Inside Story’, ‘Concerning One Delusion’, ‘A Painful Dilemma’ and other such fascinating titles. It promises to hold many matters that will be new to me I think.

Press for February 2024

’Reimagined Jungle Book ‘crosses boundaries.’ City News (Canberra), 4 February 2024. Online at this link.

Michelle Potter, 29 February 2024

Featured image: Jon Trimmer as Captain Hook in Russell Kerr’s Peter Pan. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 1999. Photo: © Maarten Holl

Tutus on Tour. Royal New Zealand Ballet

24 February 2024. Te Raukura, Kapiti
reviewed by Jennifer Shennan

The two recently appointed directors at RNZB, Tobias Perkins and Ty King-Wall, express in the program’s introduction their hope that the national Tutus on Tour production will leave the audience captivated, moved and wanting more. It did and we do.

The program opens with a set of excerpts from Swan Lake, staged after Russell Kerr’s treasured production from 1996. Usually we see either the complete four act ballet (which RNZB will perform in May this year), or just Act II as a stand-alone piece. Here however is a totally new experience—the full four acts reduced to a 40 minute abridged version, so it’s the classic story but without the trimmings, and on a tiny budget. Far from reducing the impact of the mighty original, this in an unexpected way brings out a poignancy and intimacy in the interactions between the characters, in what is effectively a chamber version of the choreography. And with soloists of this calibre, we lose nothing of the quality.

Turid Revfeim has staged the piece with care—but she swiftly credits David McAllister (who has been Interim Artistic Director at RNZB this past year) with the actual choice and sequence of excerpts. There’s no von Rothbart on stage for example but his evil presence is caught in the orchestral overture (in very good amplification in this excellent venue). The performance is danced to a 2013 recording of Nigel Gaynor conducting the NZSO, back in that memorable era when RNZB retained their own conductor on the staff, and he’d be the best ballet conductor, music advisor and arranger that you could want. We’re off to a very good start indeed, bathing in sumptuous Tchaikovsky.

The cygnets are the pert little favourites and do very well. Laurynas Vejalis, a brooding Siegfried, dances powerful allegro legwork with adagio arms (that’s a whole lot harder to do than it sounds, and the results affect our pulse and breathing). Then he and Mayu Tanigaito as Odette develop an exquisite rapport in the pas de deux from Act II. This was a revelation and may have to do with the smaller proportions of the venue? In a full-sized theatre all the dancers have to project a larger-than-life scale to reach the back of the Gods. Here there’s little distance from stage to audience and that means the pair can dance solely to, with and for each other. Neither of them looks at the audience, we are merely voyeurs of their love-making. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.

There’s a charming pas de trois danced by Calum Gray, Catarina Estévez Collins and Cadence Barrack. Calum has a new strength and presence which is a pleasure to see. Then follows a smashing Neopolitan number by Ema Takahashi and Dane Head that sizzles the stage. Wow.

There’s a new Siegfried now, the sharp and spirited Kihiro Kusukami, to dance with Odile, Katherine Minor—and here’s another triumph, again I think in part due to the intimate scale of the venue. Siegfried looks only at his ‘love’ (but it’s ‘the wrong woman’, you fool), while she, the beautiful brazen two-faced prostitute, looks at him just often enough to keep him mesmerised, but also at times at us, not with a smile exactly, more of a sneer and a wink, as if to say ‘Aren’t I clever to seduce a prince like this and do my father’s bidding at the same time?’ It’s a very skilled performance indeed, and cadences a miniature ballet we will long remember.

After the interval comes Alice Topp’s Clay, a pas de deux from her Logos, to music by Einaudi, seen here in 2023. Performed by Mayu Tanigaito and Levi Teachout, this is in extreme contrast of movement style and vocabulary from the previous work and Mayu reveals the great range of her performing ability. With tightly focussed tension, the drama of their pas de deux recalls the choreography of the full work.

Shaun James Kelly has re-worked Prismatic (from the larger cast first seen in last year’s Platinum season). The bright and energised piece pays homage to the neo-classical gem, Prismatic Variations, co-choregraphed by Russell Kerr and Poul Gnatt in 1959. The ascetic aura of that talisman work cannot be easily imitated, but I do wonder if the dancers’ facial expressions and smiles could be reined in and at least in parts replaced by the meditative neutrality that gave the original work such a celestial aura and mana. There are striking sequences and shapes throughout the choreography, with a final triumphant sculpture of the group of twelve dancers that suggests the crow’s nest or bowsprit of a ship sailing on the high seas.

I very much value the printed program for its thoughtful and detailed content. The Company is entering a new era, and one can only wish them all safe travels and happy dancing in this tour around the country. Half the Company does the North and half the South Island, which gives valuable access for younger dancers to try new roles. Audiences in twelve centres will be thrilled to have them back. Some in those audiences will remember the tours of 156 towns that Poul Gnatt took New Zealand Ballet to in 1950s. He persuaded them to enrol as Friends of the Ballet and their 5-shillings subs paid for the petrol to drive to the next town. The rest is history.

Jennifer Shennan, 26 February 2024

Featured image: Front cover image for the program for Tutus on Tour showing Mayu Tanigaito as Odile in Swan Lake. Photo: © Ross Brown

Farewell to a year of dance, 2023

by Jennifer Shennan

In Maori custom an address or oratory always opens with acknowledgment of those recently deceased, recognising ‘the mighty totara trees that have fallen.’ That puts Jon Trimmer right up there in the first line since he is/was unarguably the hero of New Zealand dance. Knighted for his unmatched artistry, and the longevity of his fabled performance career, Jon was loved by so many—for all the roles he danced but also for the plain common decency in the man. Fastidiously professional about his own work, he was always interested in the work of others, ever standing by to help should that be needed. Jon may have passed (26 October 2023, aged 84) but the memories of his mighty performance career will never be forgotten, never. Nor will we see his like again, ever. Jon carried the mantle from Poul Gnatt and Russell Kerr to safeguard the Company for decades. That now passes to those performers and directors who lead RNZBallet. One can only wish them courage. [The Company’s public tribute to Jon will be held in Wellington on Friday 2 February, 2024. See Company’s website for details and reservations. The next Russell Kerr lecture in Ballet & Related Arts, on Sunday 25 February 2024, will be devoted to Jon. Presenters include Turid Revfeim, Anne Rowse, Kerry-Anne Gilberd, Michelle Potter. For details and reservations, email jennifershennan@xtra.co.nz). Links to my obituaries for Jon are at this link and at www.stuff.co.nz

Jon Trimmer as Dr Coppélius in *Coppélia*. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 1996. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

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The Auckland Arts Festival began the year with two striking productions—Revisor, stunning dance-theatre choreographed by Crystal Pite, with dancers playing actors playing dancers. Scored in Silence was a deeply moving film-dance testament to the experiences of the profoundly deaf community of Hiroshima 1945.

Royal New Zealand Ballet’s mid-year season Lightscapes, had four works with for me the standout Requiem for a Rose by Annabella Lopez-Orcha—a beautiful mysterious meditation, and the powerfully atmospheric Logos by Alice Topp (an RNZB alumna). Their single performance Platinum, was a tribute to 70 years achievement. My enduring memory is of Sara Garbowski dancing exquisitely in the excerpt from Giselle Act II. Sara has since retired from her 15 year performance career, and I for one am sorry we did not see her in the complete ballet. (Perhaps if she finds retirement over-rated she could come back as a guest artist to perform it in a year’s time?). The Company’s year ended with a romping return season of Loughlan Prior’s Hansel & Gretel which the rejuvenated company performed with great gusto.

Sara Garbowski in *Giselle*, Act II. *Platinum* season, Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2023. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Mary-Jane O’Reilly’s Ballet Noir, a contemporary treatment of Giselle Act II, was a phenomenal achievement—independent dancers who nevertheless performed as a seasoned company, with flawless technique, integrated design and powerful dramatic effect. We don’t do Dance Oscars, thank goodness, but if we did, this work would probably score. Another memorable season was the dance opera, (m)Orpheus, with direction and choreography by Neil Ieremia of Black Grace dance company. The dancers combined seamlessly with the singers who found nobility in a contemporary urban setting.

It was terrific to hear of Raewyn Hill’s staging Douglas Wright’s exquisite Gloria on her Co3 in Perth. Rumours of other works by Douglas in their planning for re-staging, mean I’d better be saving for an airfare. In Wellington an exhibition, Geist, of Tessa Ayling-Guhl’s photo portraits of Douglas Wright from 2015, was a moving experience. Björn Aslund choreographed a solo, geist dance, accompanied by Robert Oliver on bass viol, in the gallery. It’s always special when a dance enhances an art gallery space, uniting both art forms. A gathering was held at The Long Hall on October 14 to mark Douglas’ birthdate — and an archival screening of The Kiss Inside made compelling viewing. We plan to host a similar event every year on that date, and are grateful to Megan Adams who maintains the Douglas Wright archive with fastidious care.

A capacity audience attended the Russell Kerr lecture, this time focussing on Patricia Rianne’s celebrated career, and viewing her 1986 ballet, Bliss, based on the Katherine Mansfield short story. 2023 marks the centenary of Mansfield’s death and I was honoured to present a paper KM and Dance, at the VUW conference held to mark that.

2023 also marked the centenary of the tragic incident in which a young dancer, Phyllis Porter, was performing in the Opera House in Wellington, when her tarlatan skirt caught on the gaslight in the wings and she was horribly burnt, and died four days later. Shades of Emma Livry in Paris, though no-one here makes a pilgrimage to Phyllis’ resting place.

2023 offered several memorable dance videos—the Arts channel had a repeat screening of the splendid Cloudgate in Lin Hwai Min’s Rice. Firestarter about Bangarra Dance Theatre again made compelling viewing. A doco, The Boy Who Couldn’t Stop Dancing told of Tom Oakley, a young Liverpool boy with serious cystic fibrosis yet who had danced his way to win a scholarship to Rambert Dance school. The outstanding force in German dance, Susanne Linke, sent me an intriguing video of her dance project, Inner Suspension, in which she shares her pedagogy and technique. (Anyone interested to receive the link could email Inge Zysk at info@susannelinke.com).

Several dance books of interest featured in my year. David McAllister was appointed Interim Artistic Director at RNZBallet. His two books, Ballet Confidential and the earlier Solo, provide access to the backstage life of the ballet and proved popular among local readers. The book Royal New Zealand Ballet at Sixty which Anne Rowse and I co-edited back in 2013, was released in a digital edition by Victoria University Press.

If I had to signal the hour and a half of the year that offered the purest dance pleasure, it would be the RNZB Company class I observed taught by David McAllister. Clarity of physics, and the miracle of anatomy, combined with music and poetry from each dancer, reveals the art, unmarked by choreography, casting, costumes and champagne—all the things we go to the ballet for. Here by contrast is the forge and the chapel where the art of the dancer is daily honed and made good. It’s my favourite thing.

Season’s greetings to all—in happy anticipation of 2024 which will see Akram Khan’s The Jungle Book Reimagined—and mid- year an intriguing project, Bismaya, in which Chamber Music New Zealand are bringing musicians from India to combine with Vivek Kinra’s Mudra dance company in a national tour and workshops. Russell Kerr’s pedigree production of Swan Lake from RNZB comes up in May, and later their mixed bill, Solace which includes a new work by Alice Topp. A return season of Liam Scarlett’s magical Midsummer Nights’ Dream is the work that keeps his talent alive.

Jennifer Shennan, 30 December 2023

Featured image: Jon Trimmer as a Stepmother in Cinderella. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 1987. Photo courtesy Royal New Zealand Ballet

Jon Charles Trimmer—KNZM, MBE

by Jennifer Shennan

It is just a week since Jon Trimmer died, but his dancing life had been the stuff of legend for decades already. He was the country’s premier ballet dancer, joining New Zealand Ballet in 1959. With only a few short periods abroad, and with Russell Kerr at the Auckland Dance Centre in the early 1970s, he remained with the Company till the age of 79. That has to be a career of unprecedented longevity in the ballet world. We’re not just talking quantity though, it’s the quality that counts.

Jon was knighted in 1999 for his outstanding career, but he nevertheless remained the kind, trusted and modest mentor and friend to many a young or mid-career dancer who ever needed advice or deserved encouragement along the way. Jon chose not to take on the role of Artistic Director, even though there was a vacancy several times, rightly sensing that such positions have a finite term, and he was committed to this company for life.

Early images of Jon Trimmer. Courtesy of Royal New Zealand Ballet

Top: (left) in rehearsal, 1967; (right) in *Carmina Burana*, 1973 (Photo: © Larry R Olive). Bottom: (left) as Carabosse in *The Sleeping Beauty*, 1979; (right) as Captain Belaye in *Pineapple Poll*, c. 1975

The splendid classical technique and intrinsic musicality in Jon’s early years saw him dance all the noble roles with finesse and sensitivity. He was an intuitive actor as well, so his reading of Albrecht in Giselle, for example, could cover the complex emotions in that role not always explored by everyone who dances it. He was the poet personified in Les Sylphides, a fine prince in Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty, and a deeply moving James in La Syphide. Poul Gnatt of course had infused that distinctive and vivacious Bournonville style in which the company he founded excelled under his direction.

Jonty, as he became affectionately known, partnered many fine dancers during his long career. Patricia Rianne who danced Giselle, La Sylphide and Sleeping Beauty with him, has written from London:

It is with great sadness that news of Jonty’s passing has reached me. He was a true creature of the theatre giving decades of his artistry to the audiences of New Zealand during his stoic membership of the Royal New Zealand Ballet. We danced together many times but most memorable were our performances of Giselle under Russell Kerr ‘s Directorship for RNZBallet in early 1970. Jon was an attentive, caring, musical and supportive partner but most of all he was fun to share the stage with.
Fond memories. RIP dear Jonty.

Patricia Rianne and Jon Trimmer in The Sleeping Beauty, 1978. Photo: © John Ashton. Courtesy Royal New Zealand Ballet

Patricia in later years would win the London Critics Award for Performer of the Year for her Giselle—and she always credited the pedigree that Russell Kerr brought to his stagings of the classics (which he had learned from Nicholas Beriosov and Stansilaw Idzikowski in his years with Festival Ballet). Russell and Jon could both have followed stellar international careers but instead they opted to dance at home, settling for miniscule incomes maybe, but nonetheless finding deep satisfaction in making calibre productions right here. Jon danced both Petrouchka and the Charlatan across several seasons of Russell’s staging of Petrouchka, which was recognised as good as anywhere in the world. The sense of gratitude I have in writing about these past seven decades is not easy to paraphrase.

When it came time to step back from the highly demanding danseur noble roles, Jon had the dramatic and comedic strengths already in place to draw on for character roles. He gave a masterful reading to the title role in André Prokovsky’s Königsmark; his Royal Swan in Bernard Hourseau’s Carmina Burana involved a stunning performance (a long solo he danced while suspended upside down on a pole). The roles created for him by Gray Veredon—the Entertainer in Ragtime Dance Company, the brooding settler in Tell Me A Tale, the ridiculous Dr Pantalone in A Servant of Two Masters were beyond description and compare. The madcap Widow Simone in La Fille Mal Gardee, the Rake in The Rake’s Progress, the grotesque Matron in Gary Harris Nutcracker, the swashbuckling Captain Hook in Russell Kerr’s fabulous Peter Pan—it’s a very long list of indelible memories for which many are grateful.

They’re all my favourites, but a particular recurring memory is of Christopher Hampson’s stunning Romeo & Juliet. Jonty played both the Friar (a bit doddery but basically a morally flawed figure who should have known better) as well as the Duke of Verona, who strode into the corpse-filled square, trampling on Prokofiev as though the score was carpet, glared down at the Montagues then at the Capulets, wordlessly telling them to stop their futile feuding. Jonty made those dual roles into the centrifugal aspect of what R&J is all about and I’ve never forgotten it.

Jon Trimmer as Friar Laurence, Joseph Skelton as Romeo and Madeleine Graham as Juliet. *Romeo & Juliet*, 2017. Photo: © Stephen A’Court. Courtesy Royal New Zealand Ballet

Some years back I took a friend’s child to a matinée of Petrouchka. Part way through, a fire alarm stopped the show and audience and dancers alike were tipped out of the Opera House. We sat in the sunshine of Pigeon Park opposite the theatre and waited, some half hour as I recall, for the all-clear. It so happened that Jonty was playing Charlatan fully costumed in his finery and made up to the max, he strolled across and sat down beside us, chatting quietly about this and that, the weather as it were … and letting us peer at the make-up on his hands, transformed into those of a 1,000-year-old charlatan. It was spooky and amazing, to the very cuticle, and I’ve never forgotten it—as we will never forget him.

Dani the librarian at Paekakariki, Jon’s home village just north of Wellington, told me yesterday that everyone there knew and loved Jonty. ‘We would vie to offer him a ride home from The Deli after he’d sat there for morning coffee and cake … we would purposely drive very slowly so as to get more stories out of him,’ she confessed. That was Jonty.

Jon Charles Trimmer, KNZM, MBE

born 18 September, 1939, Petone

died 26 October, 2023, Paekakariki

Image courtesy of Royal New Zealand Ballet

Sources: Coral Trimmer, Anne Rowse, Turid Revfeim, Patricia Rianne, Dani the Librarian.

Jennifer Shennan, 2 November 2023

Featured image: Jon Trimmer as the Charlatan in Petrouchka. Photo: © Evan Li. Courtesy Evan Li

Platinum. Royal New Zealand Ballet

13 October 2023. St. James Theatre, Wellington
reviewed by Jennifer Shennan

Platinum is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. It has remarkable resistance to corrosion, even at high temperatures, and is therefore considered a noble metal. It is the traditional gift used to mark the 70 year anniversary of a relationship.

That makes Platinum a well-chosen title for this single performance in the Company’s home theatre of St. James, Wellington. The 70 year legacy of this intrepid little troupe of dancers reaches back to the legendary Poul Gnatt, and equally heroic Russell Kerr and Jon Trimmer, among many others. That mantle now falls on younger shoulders to maintain the morale, health and welfare of the dancers, as of us all, for the next 70 years.

The program comprised four group works, six pas de deux and two solos, each of which will have been somebody’s favourite.

The opening work, Te Ao Mārama, by Moss Patterson, on his whakapapa (lineage), seen in the Company’s recent Lightscapes program, maintains its integrity in a strong haka taparahi performance by the all-male cast. Later in the program an all-female cast performed Stand To Reason, Andrea Shermoly’s impressive tribute, as strong as any haka, to the Suffragette pioneers. Two male solos, Val Caniparoli’s Aria, a striking work to Handel, and Mark Baldwin’s Nobody Takes Me Seriously to the rhythmically lively song by Split Enz, were both stylishly performed.

(left) Joshua Douglas (a student at New Zealand School of Dance) in *Aria*; (right) Shaun James Kelly in *Nobody Takes Me Seriously*. *Platinum*, Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2023. Photos: © Stephen A’Court

There is real challenge for a pas de deux to capture the style and context of its full-length parent work, though the Don Quixote and Black Swan items did achieve this admirably. We saw Mayu Tanigaito in both, shining as a dancer of highest calibre, her fabulous technique always serving interpretation, never the other way around.

Mayu Tanigaito and Laurynas Véjalis *Black Swan*. *Platinum*, Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2023. Photo: © Stephen A’Court

Sara Garbowski in the Act 2 excerpt from Giselle gave an exquisitely poetic performance with beautifully judged dynamics and phrasing of movement. This was from the celebrated production by Ethan Stiefel and Johan Kobborg in 2012, followed by the outstanding feature film directed by Toa Fraser—the best film the Company has ever produced of its repertoire. It’s worth noting that the recording here was by Orchestra Wellington conducted by Michael Lloyd, so the music’s calibre for dancing was guaranteed.

I will confess my concern at the poor amplification of the music accompaniment for several of the other items, however. Does the St. James Theatre need to invest in installation of a better quality sound system?

Unusually, none of the items carried a staging credit. The Bournonville works, Flower Festival in Genzano and La Sylphide, were challenged to capture the distinctive technique and vivacious style of the Danish heritage that this company inherited from Poul Gnatt all those decades ago.

Laurynas Véjalis (left) and Kirby Selchow in moments from *La Sylphide*. *Platinum*, Royal New Zealand Ballet, 2023. Photos: © Stephen A’Court

The final work, for full company, was a premiere—Prismatic, choreographed by Shaun James Kelly, a tribute to the Company’s landmark work, Prismatic Variations, made by Russell Kerr and Poul Gnatt in 1959. There was an attractive energy, personality and enthusiasm from this cast, with a spirited final image of a dancer poised aloft high above all the group, suggesting airborne hope. It was in considerable contrast to the original choreography, five couples in a work of abstract, astringent and timeless classicism, echoing the geometric design of backcloth by Raymond Boyce.

The music—Brahm’s Variations on Haydn’s St Anthony Chorale—always seemed to flood the auditorium with joy and elation. Here in a recording by the Berlin Philharmonic, conducted by Herbert von Karajan, you would expect no less, but again the theatre’s amplification seemed unable to offer the exhilaration we remember as an intrinsic part of the choreography.

It seemed a missed moment not to have brought on stage the incoming Artistic Director, Ty King-Wall, and the new Executive Director, Tobias Perkins, so we could welcome them—and also thank the outgoing Interim Artistic Director, David McAllister, for having stabilised the Company during its transition year.

Roses are the traditional flowers to mark 70 years and even one bouquet would have brought a sense of occasion and celebration to the stage full of talent. Instead, I came home and picked at midnight the single rose left in my windswept garden to place in a vase, as gratitude for seven decades of dancers who always gave and give their all.

Three talisman photos grace the printed program—Mayu Tanigaito and Laurynas Véjalis in Black Swan pas de deux; Patricia Rianne and Jon Trimmer in the 1978 production of The Sleeping Beauty; Russell Kerr and June Kerr in Prismatic Variations, 1960. Roses to them all.

Jennifer Shennan, 15 October 2023

Dance diary. February 2023 (Russell Kerr Lecture)

This month’s dance diary focuses on just one event—the 2023 Russell Kerr Lecture in Ballet and the Related Arts held in the Long Hall, Wellington, on Sunday 26 February.

Russell Kerr Lecture 2023

The fifth Russell Kerr Lecture in Ballet and the Related Arts focused on the career of New Zealand-born dancer, Patricia Rianne. Rianne’s career has been astonishingly diverse beginning in 1959 with New Zealand Ballet, then under the direction of the company’s founder, Poul Gnatt, and continuing across the world while being interspersed with return visits to New Zealand to perform again with the national company.

Patricia Rianne as the Dowager Duchess, with Carl Myers and others, in *Swan Lake*. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 1985. Photographer not identified

This fifth Russell Kerr lecture was somewhat different from previous ones in that it was not so much a lecture as an event in which the various parts, spread over the length of the session, came together in a theatrical whole. It began with dance and music from Workbook created in the early 18th century by Kellom Tomlinson and performed on this occasion by Robert Oliver on bass viol and dancer Keith McEwing performing a Sarabande from the Tomlinson repertoire. And how many of us knew of the extent of the beats and turns that characterise this dance form—I didn’t so it was a thrill to see the dance close up. Then followed, with Rianne seated in the front row of the audience, a short biography of Rianne spoken by Jennifer Shennan with input from Anne Rowse. Throughout this spoken presentation, images of Rianne in a variety of roles were projected onto a screen giving us a clear idea of the range of companies and works in which she had appeared, and of her illustrious partners who included Peter Schaufuss, Ivan Nagy and Rudolf Nureyev.

Next up, singer Pamela Gray entertained us with a truly remarkable rendition of a Maori song E Hine (A Woman), sung a cappella (except for a moment when Gray played, briefly, a ukulele-type instrument). Riveting and very moving. Then Rianne took the floor herself and engaged in a conversation with Geordan Wilcox. This conversation was definitely a highlight, especially as Rianne explained much about her work with Russell Kerr giving those of us who did not know him personally, or work with him in any way, an insight into his methods, his choreography and his teaching and coaching skills. Very appropriate given that the lecture series honours Kerr.

Patricia Rianne and Geordan Wilcox in conversation, 2023. Photo: © Evan Li

The conversation concluded with video footage from Bliss, a work choreographed by Rianne in 1986 based on a short story by Katherine Mansfield.

Following her retirement from performing following the birth of her second child, Rianne began a new career in dance as a teacher, director and choreographer.

(left) Robert Oliver playing the bass viol for Keith McEwing’s performance of the Tomlinson Sarabande. Photo: © Evan Li, 2023; (right) Kerry-Anne Gilberd in *Bliss*. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 1986. Photographer not identified

The Russell Kerr Lecture series began with the aim of presenting five events, an aim that has now been achieved, albeit with a slight hiatus due to the COVID pandemic. It is not yet clear whether a second series, or even a single 6th session, might be presented. All five in the first series have been remarkable achievements and we can but hope that somehow the series will continue.

The series:
2018 Dr Michelle Potter on the career of designer Kristian Fredrikson.
2019 Dr Ian Lochhead on the visits to New Zealand of Russian ballet companies, 1930s and 1940s.
2020 Jennifer Shennan on the life and work of Douglas Wright
2021 Anne Rowse on the life and career of Russell Kerr
2023 Patricia Rianne (as above)

Michelle Potter, 28 February 2023

Dance diary. January 2023

New choreography about women writers

The featured image for this post shows dancers of the Royal New Zealand Ballet in rehearsal for a new work from Loughlan Prior, Woman of Words, which will have its premiere at the Wanaka Festival of Colour with two performances on 27 March 2023. Woman of Words focuses on the career of New Zealand writer Katherine Mansfield, and in a recent newsletter Prior writes:

Mansfield played a central role in modern literature by experimenting with style, subject matter and theme, with the analysis of anxiety, sexuality and existentialism embroiled within her writing. In remining true to her brilliant and singular voice, she created a body of work that redefined the genre.

Katherine’s intense, captivating and all too short a life is brought to the stage using integrated text and sound design in collaboration with award winning editor Matthew Lambourn. Beginning with her early years growing up in Wellington, to the height of London bohemia and the Bloomsbury group, to her death at the age of thirty-four, Woman of Words celebrates Katherine’s winding journey and her passion for creativity, love and life.

See this link for more about Loughlan Prior. And if Prior’s recent works are anything to go by, Woman of Words will be a courageous production.

But to my surprise (and pleasure), I was reminded that another choreographer is looking at a woman writer as the subject of a new dance work, this time for Queensland Ballet. British-born Cathy Marston is preparing a one act ballet that focuses on the work of Australian writer Miles Franklin (full name Stella Maria Sarah Miles Franklin). It will premiere in Brisbane on 16 June as part of a triple bill season named Trilogy. Marston has been called a ‘narrative ballet choreographer’ so it will be interesting to see how the narrative unfolds in My Brilliant Career. But two women writers as subject matter within the space of just a few months has to be somewhat remarkable!

Publicity image for Cathy Marston’s new work, *My Brilliant Career.*

For more about Cathy Marston and the development of My Brilliant Career, see this link from Queensland Ballet. Another link will take you to an interview with set and costume designer for My Brilliant Career, David Fleischer.

Russell Kerr Lecture 2023

From my colleague Jennifer Shennan, here is the news about the next Russell Kerr Lecture.

The fifth Russell Kerr Lecture in Ballet & Related Arts will focus on Patricia Rianne, New Zealand dancer, choreographer and teacher with an extended career both here and abroad. She was a member of New Zealand Ballet, Ballet de l’Opéra de Marseilles, Ballet Rambert (in its new guise after Norman Morrice took over the directorship from Marie Rambert), Scottish Ballet, and was memorably partnered by Rudolf Nureyev, Peter Schaufuss, Ivan Nagy and Jon Trimmer. Trisha staged classic productions and choreographed for RNZ Ballet, also in China and Hong Kong, and taught at NZSchool of Dance and London School of Contemporary Dance. Her choreography for RNZB, Bliss, inspired by the story by Katherine Mansfield, will also feature within the lecture.

Sunday 4.00—6.00pm, 26 February 2023
The Long Hall, Roseneath, Wellington.
email jennifershennan@xtra.co.nz for registration

Patricia Rianne as the Dowager Princess in *Swan Lake*. Royal New Zealand Ballet, 1985.

News from James Batchelor

It is always interesting to hear James Batchelor’s latest news as he traverses the world making work. In 2023, however, in addition to being in Europe on several occasions, he has a number of engagements in Australia, especially in Canberra and Melbourne. He lists the following as ‘upcoming in 2023’:

Performances of Deepspace and Hyperspace in Europe soon to be announced.
Performances of Shortcuts to Familiar Places in Ngunnawal Country/Canberra and Naarm/Melbourne.
Long-form workshop and creation for Canberra Dance Theatre.
New creation with students from the Victorian College of the Arts.
Residencies in Turin, Potsdam and Nîmes for research and development of collaboration Echo Field with Arad Inbar and Leeza Pritychenko.
New creation with Norrdans in Sweden.

Below is a brief trailer for Shortcuts to Familiar Places, a work in which Batchelor explores a movement lineage through his childhood dance teacher Ruth Osborne to the modern dance pioneer Gertrud Bodenwieser.

Talking to Shaun Parker

Just recently I had the pleasure of talking to Shaun Parker about his return season of KING to take place at the Seymour Centre from 24 February to 4 March as part of Sydney WorldPride. I am planning to include a longer website post ‘Talking to Shaun Parker’ in February.

Dance Australia e-news

Some readers may be interested in this link.

Michelle Potter, 31 January 2023