dance theatre
Der Fensterputzer, Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, Sadler’s WellsTuesday, 19 June 2012It may be that designer Peter Pabst is the unsung hero of Tanztheater Wuppertal’s “World Cities” extravaganza. When the lights go down at Sadler’s Wells for Der Fensterputzer (The Window-washer), the stage is dominated by a vast mountain of glowing... Read more... |
Ten Chi, Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, Barbican TheatreMonday, 18 June 2012The Japanese dance public is overwhelmingly female, so it’s not surprising that Pina Bausch’s paean to Saitama, Ten Chi, is so girly. The fourth in the series of “World Cities” that’s sold out London’s two great dance centres, the Barbican and... Read more... |
...Como El Musguito..., Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, Sadler's WellsWednesday, 13 June 2012If you are tired of life, tired of London, or even tired of love, muster the remaining fibres of your frazzled being and do whatever it takes to get tickets for ...como el musguito en la piedra, ay si, si, si... or any of the other performances in... Read more... |
Nur Du, Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, Barbican TheatreMonday, 11 June 2012Many people will be having their first taste of the late Pina Bausch’s dance-theatre in this copious London retrospective of 10 of her “World City” productions; others will have bought into several of the series, possibly by now wondering how many... Read more... |
Viktor, Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, Sadler's WellsThursday, 07 June 2012It stymies any tourist to sum up for others what they saw abroad. Still more challenging, to create (or recreate) for theatre as a choreographer something more than superficial, more than clichéd about Italy, Japan, Los Angeles, Istanbul, these most... Read more... |
Artifact, Royal Ballet of Flanders, Sadler's WellsFriday, 20 April 2012William Forsythe's position as the most articulate, fascinating, provocative ballet choreographer of the past 25 years is demonstrated by the Royal Ballet of Flanders' brief visit to Sadler's Wells for three nights with his epic, maddening,... Read more... |
Can We Talk About This? DV8 Physical Theatre, National TheatreTuesday, 13 March 2012“Do you feel morally superior to the Taliban? Well, do you?” And we’re off, with another of director/choreographer Lloyd Newson’s interrogations of a taboo subject. DV8 Physical Theatre is 25 years old this season, yet if anything, it, and Newson,... Read more... |
Fabulous Beast Dance Theatre, Rian, Sadler's WellsTuesday, 25 October 2011Wallets have been emptied by the proliferation of outstanding dance evenings in the past month - Akram Khan’s Desh, Lucinda Childs, the Merce Cunningham farewell - but increase your overdraft, for here is a heart-lifting and ingeniously ingenuous... Read more... |
Akram Khan, DESH, Sadler's Wells TheatreThursday, 06 October 2011It takes more than utmost craft and rich personality to hold the stage as a soloist - it takes a touch of divine self-belief, which Akram Khan has never displayed to more magnetic effect before than in his new solo DESH. Actually solo is too small a... Read more... |
Dave St-Pierre Company, Un Peu de Tendresse, Sadler's WellsFriday, 03 June 2011When asked if I wanted to go and see two dozen naked Canadians doing audience participation, the answer was, self-evidently, nonononononononono. And then, for good measure, NO. Well, I’m here to tell you, I was wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. And I... Read more... |
The Centaur and the Animal, Sadler's WellsTuesday, 01 March 2011To achieve a black stage that emits or reflects no light is a hell of an achievement. To place a huge black horse with black rider onto that stage, without the slightest noise, and to contrive a black shadow on the black, is to create an image found... Read more... |
I Don't Believe in Outer Space, The Forsythe Company, Sadler's WellsTuesday, 22 February 2011An audience favourite has a USP that fills the house as long as they maintain the suspense - with William Forsythe, it’s the quality Diaghilev prized: unpredictability. When he set out in Germany in the 1980s he evolved an extreme classical ballet.... Read more... |