balletLORENT’s Snow White is darkly beautiful and disturbing, with just a hint of magic.
Children watching ballet often have absolutely no idea of what’s going on. People are moving around and they look really lovely – but what are they actually doing and what’s it all about? The way this company solve that particular problem is simply to have a narrator telling the story, essentially providing someone to hold your hand and guide you through the plot.
balletLORENT however, don’t just have any old narration, their story is told through the words of none other than the Poet Laureate herself, the inimitable Glasgow-born Carol Ann Duffy. Duffy takes the story back to the original version in which it is Snow White’s real mother, not her stepmother, who becomes so jealous of her daughter’s beauty that she is driven to murder.
Under Duffy’s unflinching gaze, the mother’s obsession with her appearance and shallow preoccupation with all things bright and beautiful, seem weirdly bang up to date despite being couched in the fairy tale’s old-fashioned rhythms and familiar turns of phrase. Asked who is the fairest, this mirror responds, ‘Queen, your beauty is a gift from scissors, surgery, face-lift…’.
Giving voice to Duffy’s sharp and fresh narrative, is Scottish Olivier- and Tony-award winning actress Lindsay Duncan, whose lack of vocal sentimentality brings the cruelty and compassion into sharp relief. The extraordinary music is composed by Murray Gold (perhaps most well-known for having composed all the Dr.Who music since its revival in 2005), and the exquisite yet efficient three-faceted revolving set is designed by TMA award winner Phil Eddolls.
This gem of a ballet company who produce such original, powerful and entertaining work, doesn’t really do ballet at all. While many of their dancers are classically trained, expressive movement is more their thing. The dancers are also neither all young nor all slight and slender. They are, however, fit and athletic and, in common with the rest of the creative team, know just how to engage and hold on to an audience.
This visual feast, served with novel music and nuanced meaning is unsettlingly entrancing.
22nd & 23rd January 2016