Inspiration from an eclectic mix of classical dance, theatre, popular culture, literature and opera helps the creative team to develop new and original productions and create innovative interpretations of popular classical ballets.
Northern Ballet is the three times consecutive winner of the Audience Award – the only award voted for by the public at The Critics’ Circle National Dance Awards.
Discover the magic of Northern Ballet for yourself - step aboard the train to dreamworld by booking those tickets.
Georgina Butler
> Northern Ballet’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream opens at Milton Keynes Theatre on Tuesday, May 20 and continues until Saturday May, 24.
> Northern Ballet's 'The Three Little Pigs comes to Milton Keynes Theatre on Friday May 23, with performances at 11.30am and 1.30pm (the child-friendly performances each last approximately 35 minutes and tickets are just £5).
Call Milton Keynes Theatre Box Office on 0844 871 7652 or visit www.atgtickets.com/
NORTHERN BALLET: A DREAMY INTERPRETATION OF SHAKESPEARE'S FAIRY-FILLED ROM-COM
A witty, balletic take on Shakespeare’s fantastically funny play A Midsummer Night’s Dream is on its way to Milton Keynes Theatre from Tuesday (20 May).
Northern Ballet will weave their usual magic with an imaginative adaptation of the Bard’s production which swaps Athenians in classical Greece for a touring ballet company in post-war Britain.
The romantic antics of the dancers are played out on one magical night in the 1940s as the company travels by sleeper train from London to Edinburgh.
After rehearsals for a performance of Romeo and Juliet, the artistic director, Theseus (soon to be married to Hippolyta, his principal dancer), decides it is time for Hippolyta to stop dancing.
He demands she retire from her role as Juliet.
The ballet master, Robin Puck, encourages Theseus to allow his protégée Demetrius to play Romeo to Hermia’s Juliet.
However, the course of true love never did run smoothly - Hermia is in love with Lysander and wishes to play Juliet opposite her real-life Romeo.
To further complicate matters, Nick Bottom, the company carpenter, is in love with Hippolyta.
As the company travel on an overnight train to the next stop on the tour, they pass through a tunnel – and enter an enchanted dreamworld where their romantic entanglements cause even more confusion.
David Nixon, OBE, has been Northern Ballet’s Artistic Director for almost a decade.
He first created A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Northern Ballet in 2003 and recalls what attracted him to the play.
David said: “For me it was the fact that it had the potential to be a comedy that works in dance which is something that is difficult to find.
“It was a chance to create a ‘fun’ piece and that was exciting.”
He describes one of the most challenging aspects of the story to successfully turn into dance as being the ‘play within a play’ element.
In Shakespeare’s text, the characters perform the play Pyramus and Thisbe.
This acts as a comment on the role parents play when they try to control love, which echoes the rebellion of Hermia against her father.
Cleverly, Northern Ballet’s production incorporates a ballet within a ballet.
David and his creative team selected Romeo and Juliet due to its reflection of similar themes of control and confusion.
David said: “It took a while for us to work out how to translate that into something which would work in our interpretation.”
He adds: “There were some real challenges in creating the production in terms of choreography.
“The main one facing me initially, having set the production in a real ballet company, was how to separate the world of real dance which we were trying to create on stage from the fact that this was also a ballet production.
“It came down to theatricality in the end and we had to set up the convention early in the performance so that the audience would understand what was happening.
“We have them dance en pointe whilst in the class but the ‘real’ people don’t dance en pointe when they are just themselves.
“In Act 2, where the whole world is topsy-turvy, there is a mixture of both.”
The ballet takes audiences on a spectacular journey from the stylish elegance of the 1940s to a technicolour dreamworld where Puck’s magical mayhem weaves a tangled web of love.
So why the 1940s for the ‘real world’ parts of the production?
David said: “The 1940s seemed to fit as that was when ballet was really huge in the UK.
“It was really when it started to take off.
“It was also a time when hierarchy within companies was so important and we needed that for the story to work – it’s there in the play with Theseus and Hippolyta.
“We needed to have that dynamic of power.”
Northern Ballet prides itself on creating full-length ballets which appeal to as many people as possible, including youngsters, who will be catered for on this visit with a short children’s ballet based on The Three Little Pigs.
Inspiration from an eclectic mix of classical dance, theatre, popular culture, literature and opera helps the creative team to develop new and original productions and create innovative interpretations of popular classical ballets.
Northern Ballet is the three times consecutive winner of the Audience Award – the only award voted for by the public at The Critics’ Circle National Dance Awards.
Discover the magic of Northern Ballet for yourself - step aboard the train to dreamworld by booking those tickets.
Georgina Butler
> Northern Ballet’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream opens at Milton Keynes Theatre on Tuesday, May 20 and continues until Saturday May, 24.
> Northern Ballet's 'The Three Little Pigs comes to Milton Keynes Theatre on Friday May 23, with performances at 11.30am and 1.30pm (the child-friendly performances each last approximately 35 minutes and tickets are just £5).
Call Milton Keynes Theatre Box Office on 0844 871 7652 or visit www.atgtickets.com/
Inspiration from an eclectic mix of classical dance, theatre, popular culture, literature and opera helps the creative team to develop new and original productions and create innovative interpretations of popular classical ballets.
Northern Ballet is the three times consecutive winner of the Audience Award – the only award voted for by the public at The Critics’ Circle National Dance Awards.
Discover the magic of Northern Ballet for yourself - step aboard the train to dreamworld by booking those tickets.
Georgina Butler
> Northern Ballet’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream opens at Milton Keynes Theatre on Tuesday, May 20 and continues until Saturday May, 24.
> Northern Ballet's 'The Three Little Pigs comes to Milton Keynes Theatre on Friday May 23, with performances at 11.30am and 1.30pm (the child-friendly performances each last approximately 35 minutes and tickets are just £5).
Call Milton Keynes Theatre Box Office on 0844 871 7652 or visit www.atgtickets.com/
